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© 2025 Island Innovation. All rights reserved.

    News

    Curated stories and analysis from islands and sustainability leaders worldwide.

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    All ThemesCircular EconomyClimate ActionConnectivity & DigitizationCulture & CommunityEnergy & TransportGreen Finance & EconomyOcean & BiodiversityPolicy & GovernanceTourism & Remote WorkWater & Food
    Showing 9 of 111 news items in Circular Economy
    Indigenous-centred prawn farm collaboration to make a splash on Tiwi Islands
    Circular EconomyJanuary 30, 2024

    Indigenous-centred prawn farm collaboration to make a splash on Tiwi Islands

    Photo: Pilot farm, Larrakia Country in Darwin. Retrieved from csiro.au On the serene Tiwi Islands, Simon Irvin and his five-person team are reshaping tiger prawn farming. Northern Australia holds untapped potential for sustainable prawn farming. Simon is our aquaculture biology team leader. He and his team are building opportunities and improving outcomes for remote communities. In a co-design model, we have partnered with [Tiwi Resources](https://www.tiwiresources.com.au/) and the Portaminni Trust. This means all partners collaboratively design the pilot to create a path to a more sustainable future for the Tiwi Islands. Our [Indigenous Science and Engagement Program](https://www.csiro.au/en/research/indigenous-science) worked with the Northern Steering Committee to facilitate engagement, leverage resources and provide an extra cultural lens for CSIRO. These partnerships helped Traditional Owners and other stakeholders travel to Vietnam to learn from their successful prawn farming industry.

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    As Development Alters Greek Islands’ Nature and Culture, Locals Push Back
    Circular EconomyJanuary 23, 2024

    As Development Alters Greek Islands’ Nature and Culture, Locals Push Back

    With a deluge of foreign visitors fueling seemingly nonstop development on once pristine Greek islands, local residents and officials are beginning to fight back, moving to curb a wave of construction that has started to cause water shortages and is altering the islands’ unique cultural identity. Tourism is crucial in Greece, accounting for a fifth of the country’s economic output, and communities on many islands depend on it. But critics say the development has spiraled out of control in some areas, particularly on islands like Mykonos and Paros, where large-scale hotel complexes have mushroomed in recent years. Teachers and other professionals in those and other Cycladic islands, a popular cluster in the Aegean Sea, have struggled to find affordable housing amid an influx of visitors and home buyers, fueling [growing protests by locals](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/15/world/greece-beach-towel-protests.html) over the repercussions of rampant tourism. The islands, at the forefront of Greece’s tourism boom, are facing increasingly urgent calls to preserve their natural and cultural heritage.

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    Guadeloupe in murky waters: French islands hit by wastewater treatment scandal
    Circular EconomyJanuary 22, 2024

    Guadeloupe in murky waters: French islands hit by wastewater treatment scandal

    Located in the heart of the French Caribbean, Guadeloupe is best known for its beaches, rivers and waterfalls. But beyond the postcard image, more than 70 percent of wastewater treatment plants in the island are out of order – or nearly – despite significant funding, particularly from the European Union. The result is a health and environmental catastrophe that threatens all the bathing waters in this French overseas archipelago. FRANCE 24’s Karina Chabour investigated years of poor management.

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    Grenada, Dominica lead charge in OECS waste management transformation
    Circular EconomyJanuary 16, 2024

    Grenada, Dominica lead charge in OECS waste management transformation

    Excerpt and Photo from stvincenttimes.com New Waste Characterisation****Reports are in for Dominica and Grenada. The findings are critical for tailoring the Recycle OECS Model framework to the waste landscape of these Member States. Dominica and Grenada are selected OECS territories implementing Model Demonstration projects, paving the way for the rest of the OECS Waste Management sector. **Dominica:**For Dominica, the Waste Characterisation exercise could not have been more urgent, as plastic usage trends have significantly altered the waste landscape from 2002 when the Dominica Solid Waste Management Corporation last conducted a waste study. Between July 22 – 28, 2023, the Dominica Solid Waste Management Corporation (DSWMC) conducted a dual waste classification exercise covering co-mingled municipal solid waste and source-separated recyclable packaging waste at the Fond Cole Sanitary Landfill Site. It also sought to identify the sub-categories of plastics within the waste stream and assess the potential for recycling under the Recycle OECS initiative. According to the 2023 Study report, plastics make up 24% of Dominica’s solid waste stream with film plastics being the dominant component at 53%. Plastics rank second to organics, at 29%, followed by paper and paperboard at 17%. Within the Recycle OECS project’s focus on PET and HDPE plastics, a detailed breakdown shows film plastics at 53%, Clear PET at 24%, Other plastics at 15%, and HDPE containers at 8%.

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    From waste to product: the legacy of the Plastic Waste Free Islands (PWFI) Project in addressing plastic waste leakage
    Circular EconomyDecember 5, 2023

    From waste to product: the legacy of the Plastic Waste Free Islands (PWFI) Project in addressing plastic waste leakage

    Photo: Joao Sousa/IUCN. Retrieved from iucn.org The Caribbean region is an important biodiversity hotspot due to the high endemism on each island[[1]](https://www.iucn.org/story/202311/waste-product-legacy-plastic-waste-free-islands-pwfi-project-addressing-plastic-waste#_ftn1). Plastics and plastic pollutants are dangerous for the region, which hosts 10% of the world’s coral reefs, 1,400 species of fish and marine mammals, and extensive coastal mangroves. Pollution from solid waste, and in particular waste from plastics, has emerged as one of the greatest global challenges. In major Caribbean cities, the amount of solid waste collected can be as low as 50%. For a region whose prosperity depends on healthy marine and coastal ecosystems, there is a need for immediate action. The PWFI Project was implemented by IUCN, together with the governments and key stakeholders of Antigua and Barbuda, Grenada, and Saint Lucia. The Project generated important results at both regional and national level, especially in terms of improving knowledge of waste generation, repurposing waste into commercially viable products, making the economic and business case for taking action, and determining policy and regulatory support for the adoption of measures identified. The Project measured the amount and type of plastic waste in the tourism, fisheries, and waste management sectors, and classified it per recyclable and non-recyclable plastics. Regional estimations for plastic leakage per sector indicated that 3,087 tonnes of plastic were leaked in 2020. The largest contributors to plastic leakage were the household and commercial sectors, with 1,984 and 794 tonnes per year respectively. Plastic leakage for the tourism and fisheries sectors is significantly smaller, with 287 and 22.7 tonnes per year respectively. The top 4 types of plastics leaked into the environment were Other (7), PET (1), HDPE (2), and PP (5).

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    The remote African island where a fish festival marks the year’s biggest celebration
    Circular EconomyNovember 27, 2023

    The remote African island where a fish festival marks the year’s biggest celebration

    Photo: Inside Africa (CNN). Retrieved from edition.cnn.com. The Fête du Poisson on Rodrigues Island is an annual event that celebrates a rich fishing heritage and a deep appreciation for the sea. This is an intimate look at the people who have embraced a sustainable system to conserve their way of life.

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    Jamaica Tackles Kingston Harbor Pollution With New Technology
    Circular EconomyNovember 21, 2023

    Jamaica Tackles Kingston Harbor Pollution With New Technology

    Image Credit: Courtesy of Clean Kingston Harbor. Retrieved from cleantechnica.com Jamaica is much celebrated in songs and literature, from Harry Belafonte’s hauntingly beautiful [Jamaica Farewell](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aajSxr8nghE&t=36s) to Jimmy Buffett’s satirical [Jamaica Mistaica](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsKZewdhDtk). The island is one of the most beautiful in all the Caribbean, and home through the ages to pirates, poets, and potentates of all stripes. It is populated by a pastiche of people from all over the world who ventured there during the golden age of sailing ships, intermarried, intertwined, and created perhaps the most diverse gumbo of humanity to found anywhere on Earth. And yet, Jamaica suffers from the same curse as every other enclave of human civilization — pollution, much of it from plastics. The stuff sluices down the many valleys and gullies that surround Kingston harbor, the seventh largest in the world at 10 miles long and 2 miles wide. From there, it gets carried out to sea by the tide. Up until the 1980s, there was an annual cross harbor swimming contest, but the water became too full of trash for it to continue. Now the [Kingston Harbor Cleanup Project](https://www.cleankingstonharbour.org/) is using technology developed in the Netherlands to return the harbor to its former glory. The group has installed floating barriers at the mouth of several gullies, which are part of the area’s stormwater management system. As the water drains down from above, it brings trash with it. Anything that floats is trapped by the booms. A solar-powered boat collects the captured trash and brings it ashore to be sorted. “Things that can be recycled are picked up by the Recycling Partners of Jamaica, and the Carib company [Caribbean Cement Company] re-uses those that cannot be recycled,” operations manager Alecia Rose-Beaufort told [The Guardian](https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2023/oct/20/we-want-to-see-it-back-in-its-glory-can-the-kingston-harbour-cleanup-be-a-model-for-the-world). “So far, we have two types of solutions — barriers meant for deep waters with larger surface area and those meant for more shallow waters such as this gully beside our headquarters.”

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    Russell Ruderman: This New Program Could Help Cut Food Costs In Hawaii
    Circular EconomyNovember 13, 2023

    Russell Ruderman: This New Program Could Help Cut Food Costs In Hawaii

    Image retrieved from civilbeat.org Exceprt from civilbeat.org An exciting new project is being launched in Hilo to reduce solid waste and empower the local food industry, thanks to local nonprofit Zero Waste Hawaii Island and its partners. Zero Waste and another nonprofit, Perpetual, have been working to establish a reusable food container program in Hilo. Pilot programs have been underway for a year or so to allow glass bottles to be collected, washed and reused. The whole state can benefit from such a program, reducing our food costs, while reducing waste and our carbon footprint. These efforts will greatly reduce the cost of food. Local food vendors and producers can lower their packaging costs, which are a barrier for many food ventures. In Hawaii we pay more than most places for glass bottles, for example, due to very high shipping costs. Then we ship the used glass back to the mainland at great cost, where some of it is remade into new bottles, a huge energy cost. As it is now, a glass bottle adds about a dollar to the price of every glass-bottled beverage, and then costs more to send back as recycled glass. Deposit or not, we pay a lot more than it’s even worth to ship the bottles back. The deposit is small but your hidden costs in shipping and taxes for recycling are large and ongoing.

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    Protecting Kalayaan, saving the reefs
    Circular EconomyNovember 13, 2023

    Protecting Kalayaan, saving the reefs

    Image retrieved from businessmirror.com.ph Environment Secretary Maria Antonia Yulo-Loyzaga recently conducted a site visit to Pag-asa Island in the Kalayaan Island Group (KIG) in the disputed West Philippine Sea (WPS). A fifth-class municipality, Pag-asa is the biggest in the Philippines in terms of area with 290 sq. km, but the least populated with a population of 193 people, according to the 2020 Census. Part of the Spratly Islands—which is composed of islands, islets, cays and more than 100 reefs, sometimes grouped in submerged old atolls that lie off the coasts of the Philippines, Malaysia and southern Vietnam—KIG is a remote island municipality in the province of Palawan. Yulo-Loyzaga recently bared plans of putting up a research station on Pag-asa Island, the biggest island in the KIG and the seat of government of the municipality of Kalayaan. The plan is part of the move to start accounting the country’s natural wealth and to rev up the so-called blue economy. The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) is closely working with the University of the Philippines Diliman-College of Science through the Marine Science Institute (UP-CS-MSI) on the project.

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