Pacific Beat

A leading member of the Samoan opposition says the latest Finance Ministry figures show the country is in recession.

The Marshall Islands government has told the US it needs to consult more instead of delivering ultimatums about funding.

Sydney is playing host this week to two international conferences aimed at bringing more transparency and accountability into the resource industry, particularly in developing countries where local communities have often missed out on receiving a fair share of the economic returns from resource extraction.

The Kiribati government is today sending a second team to survey the Phoenix Islands Protected Area, or PIPA.

In Samoa, turkey tails are back.

Vanuatu is to get two plants to manufacture medical oxygen to replace oxygen imported from the Philippines.

Auckland City will represent the Oceania region at the FIFA Club World Cup in Morocco this year following its OFC Championship win against Waitakere why-tack-er-ree United last nightThe three times OFC champions defeated the club 2-1Presenter:Campbell CooneySpeaker:Daniel Markham, Media and Communications Co-Ordinator, Oceania Football Confederation' .

Former rugby league international Israel Folau has been included in the preliminary Wallabies squad for the British and Irish Lions series.

An appeal has gone out to athletes in Oceania to apply for a scholarship to study in the United States.

Fiji's sugar cane farmers are hailing this year's high payout as a sign their industry has a bright future.

An Australian youth worker has repeated a call for an urgent trans Tasman summit on the subject of gangs.

The CNMI looks likely to open its first tourism office in Russia, possibly by the end of the year.

The head of Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Peter Varghese, says Australia will continue to encourage the return to a democratic government in Fiji.

Corals off the island of Ofu in the National Park of American Samoa have the ability to grow in water that's warm enough to kill other species of coral.

Australian Scientists have discovered that malaria parasites communicate with each other in the human blood stream.

China is reportedly planning a major summit of Pacific leaders in Guangzhou in November.

Vanuatu's new Prime Minister, Moana Carcasses Kalosil, says his Government has already implemented more than half of the sixty-eight items it listed to be implemented in its first one hundred days in office.

Right now the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation is getting ready to begin a new round of research in the Pacific into the best way to eliminate bycatch of non-tuna species on Tuna Fishing boats.

In Guam the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is investigating reports of illegal dolphin poaching.