PRIME Minister Manasseh Sogavare says the two launched documents, the Solomon Islands National Ocean Policy and Malaria Elimination Roadmap is very important for the government and the country.
Sogavare highlighted this at the launching ceremony where the Prince of Wales, Prince Charles, was also part of yesterday, at the Lawson Tama stadium.
He said Solomon Islands is a large ocean state with 98.2 percent is covered by ocean and only 1.8 percent is covered by land.
“This is our reality and we are ocean people living in harmony with our ocean, our culture, our spirituality, our livelihood and our sustaining is interlinked to our ocean.
“To protect opportunities and pursue development opportunities from our ocean, we developed a robust and integrated Ocean governance policy that entrench a vision of a healthy, resilient, secure and productive ocean that support sustainable use and development for the benefit of the people of Solomon Islands now and into the future,” he added.
He said the National Ocean policy provides the framework to safe guard the health and integrity of the ocean to benefit the current generation but importantly will lead a legacy for the future generations.
“The policy will also ensure we met our National, Regional and International commitments,” he said.
Sogavare said the second document; the Malaria Elimination Roadmap is originated from the Common Wealth Health Malaria Summit in London, 2018.
He at that meeting, the Prime Ministers of Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea and Vanuatu signed on to the edge of Pacific leaders Malaria Aligns road map to eliminate Malaria in the Asia Pacific region by 2030.
“Only two countries it the Pacific Ocean have a prevalence of Malaria that is similarly in the proportion to African countries and that is Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea,” he said.
He said the Malaria elimination road map has six areas of focus.
He said for provinces that are very near elimination, the focus is to hasten the elimination by 2023.
“For provinces with Malaria under good control, the focus is to bring the Malaria levels down to pre-elimination by 2023 and to elimination by 2026.
“And for province that Malaria is endemic, the focus will be to bring Malaria under good control by 2023, bring it to pre-elimination by 2026 and to be elimination by 2029.
“Throughout the period of 2020 to 2030, efforts will be stepped up to prevent re-transmission and by 2030, there should be no local transmission of Malaria anywhere in Solomon Islands and by 2033, we anticipate World Health organisation will declare Solomon Islands Malaria free,” he added.
By IAN M.KAUKUI
