Abstract
Non-native, invasive species pose significant threats to ecosystem services, food and water security, livelihoods, and sustainability, especially in island environments and communities. The impacts of climate change can exacerbate these risks and vulnerabilities. The Regional Invasive Species and Climate Change (RISCC) management network was established to support natural resource managers and researchers in the United States by providing information and tools about these twin threats. This chapter considers the state of knowledge about invasive species and climate change in the context of the State of Hawaiʻi and the US-Affiliated Pacific Islands (which include the US Territories of Guam and American Sāmoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), the Republic of Palau, the Federated States of Micronesia, and the Republic of the Marshall Islands), and provides examples of work conducted by the Pacific RISCC to build Pacific Island resilience and sustainable outcomes through climate-literate resource management.
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The Pacific RISCC Core Team is currently comprised of representatives from American Sāmoa Community College (https://www.amsamoa.edu); CNMI Division of Fish and Wildlife (http://www.dfwcnmi.com); Hawaiʻi Coordinating Group on Alien Pest Species (https://www.cgaps.org), Guam Department of Agriculture (https://doag.guam.gov), Hawaiʻi Invasive Species Council (https://dlnr.hawaii.gov/hisc/), Micronesia Regional Invasive Species Council, Pacific Islands Climate Adaptation Science Center (https://pi-casc.soest.hawaii.edu), Pacific Regional Integrated Sciences and Assessments program (https://www.pacificrisa.org), Palau Community College (https://pcc.palau.edu); University of Guam (https://www.uog.edu), University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa (https://manoa.hawaii.edu), and US Fish and Wildlife Service (https://www.fws.gov/office/pacific-islands-fish-and-wildlife).
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The survey described in this report was organized and implemented by the East-West Center and was not conducted on behalf of the US Federal Government.
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Brewington, L. et al. (2023). Pacific Island Perspectives on Invasive Species and Climate Change. In: Walsh, S.J., Mena, C.F., Stewart, J.R., Muñoz Pérez, J.P. (eds) Island Ecosystems. Social and Ecological Interactions in the Galapagos Islands. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-28089-4_5
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