Search

This article calls for transdisciplinary, experimental, and decolonial imaginations of climate change and Pacific futures in an age of great planetary undoing. Drawing from our personal and academic knowledge of the Pacific from West Papua to Samoa, we highlight the need for radical forms of imagination that are grounded in an ethos of inclusivity, participation, and humility. Such imaginations must account for the perspectives, interests, and storied existences of both human and beyond-human communities of life across their multiple and situated contexts, along with their co-constitutive relations. We invite respectful cross-pollination across Indigenous epistemologies, secular scientific paradigms, and transdisciplinary methodologies in putting such an imagination into practice. In doing so, we seek to destabilise the prevailing hegemony of secular science over other ways of knowing and being in the world. We draw attention to the consequential agency of beyond-human lifeforms in shaping local and global worlds and to the power of experimental, emplaced storytelling in conveying the lively and lethal becoming-withs that animate an unevenly shared and increasingly vulnerable planet. The wisdom of our kindred plants, animals, elements, mountains, forests, oceans, rivers, skies, and ancestors are part of this story. Finally, we reflect on the structural challenges in decolonising climate change and associated forms of knowledge production in light of past and ongoing thefts of sovereignty over lands, bodies, and ecosystems across the tropics.

Debates around the significance, function and social value of museums are still challenging museum practices and models. In particular, the demands of “source communities” for self-representation and self-emancipation in the global community continue to call into question the role of the museum as a catalyst for promoting social change across cultures. In this paper, I push this question further by discussing the desires of a group of Roman Catholic woodcarvers in central Asmat (Indonesian Papua) to build a museum for exhibiting their carvings in the Vatican. To them, the Vatican is not only the sacred centre of Catholicism but also an integral part of their mythical world of ancestors. After a brief examination of their considerations, I attempt to put their ambitious museum idea into dialogue with current debates on “the postcolonial museum” to highlight how it can dictate new directions for indigenising museums.

A number of Emerging issues on education in Papua have been trending topic in national education for years. The objective of this research was to describe the curriculum development of inclusive education for Indigenous Students of Papua. The research was carried out in three integrated schools(Sekolah Satu Atap) where inclusive education has been successfully provided. Those schools are integrated school of Boven Digoel, Integrated School of Wasur, and SMA Negeri 1 Merauke. This was a descriptive research design by applying qualitative approach in analyzing the data. The data were collected through observation, interview, and documentation. The secondary data were collected through library study. The schools in Merauke Region and Boven Digoel Region became the object of the research. The result showed that those three integrated schools developed a special curriculum for inclusive education on Indigenous students of Papua. A large number of local wisdoms were internalized into special curriculum to support contextual learning for indigenous students of Papua. Those integrated schools can be benchmark for other regions outside Papua to develop special curriculum for inclusive education.

The abundance of clay in the Merauke district has not been utilized optimally. This is due to a lack of research and information about these clays. Clay is one of the natural minerals from the silica group whose particle size is less than two micrometers and has many uses, including basic materials for the manufacture of ceramics, paper-making materials, adsorbents, assisting drilling, and bleaching in CPO. In this study, characterization has been carried out including functional group characterization using an FTIR spectrophotometer, crystallinity using XRD, and morphological analysis by SEM. The results obtained that the mineral content of the clay from the sloping soil district was proposed to contain Illite and Quartz minerals with the main peaks of the diffractogram appearing at an angle of 2θ about 21o; 26o; 36o; and 42o; at angles d (Å) 3.34 and d (Å) 4.25. XRD results were also tested using search-match analysis, and the sample intensity was obtained containing quartz minerals (~ 98%). In the development of this material, it is necessary to obtain XRD data to determine the exact components of clay.

The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) has become a substantial topic in line with the industrial revolution 4.0 era. Digital competency represents a vital role in the IIoT framework. This study seeks to explore the digital competencies used in supporting IIoT. Respondents involved in this study were 300 people who came from students from the engineering faculty at a university in Papua. The results showed that students had mastery of digital competence for IIoT at a moderate level. This research implies an urgent need for policies from universities to be able to design strategies to improve digital competency capabilities for IIoT.

Effect of Cocoa Tree Mortality on Production Stability in a Private Estate. Yields in a 1,674 ha cocoa estate were analysed in Indonesia. The plantation, which was set up between 1981 and 1990 at Ransiki (Papua province), benefited from suitable soil and climatic conditions: good rainfall distribution and rich soils. The planting material comprised hybrids of various origins, Amelonados and local selections. Density measurements inside the plantation revealed a gradual reduction in the number of cocoa trees, from 1,250 at the outset to 835 trees/ha after 21 years. At the same time, overall yields for the same period remained stable. Cocoa tree mortality, which was responsible for the gradual reduction in density, did not affect production; neither did it alter the uniformity of the plant cover in the plots. This situation reflected an increase in tree productivity. The conditions for stabilized cocoa yields appeared to be linked not only to suitable edapho-climatic conditions and limited parasite pressure, but also to the ability of cocoa trees to increase their yields in conditions of decreasing stand due to the natural thining of the original plant population.

Eastern Indonesia is known as the center of marine biodiversity of the world as well as habitat and marine mammal migration path. Not all marine mammal events in eastern Indonesia are well documented. The purpose of this study was to determine the occurrence of marine mammals in eastern Indonesia in 2016. Data collection done through observation, indepth interview with the community and experts. The results of this study were 8 (eight) occurrences of marine mammals which were in Mollucas, North Mollucas and West Papua Provinces with the highest incidence in August. That marine mammals were Duyung (Dugong dugon), Sperm Whale (Physetermacrocephalus), Risso’s Dolphin (Grampus griseus), and 2 types of unidentified Whales. The marine mammals exist were deliberately netted by people, stranded, trapped in fishing nets or deliberately commercialized. This marine mammals stranded occurence indicate the requirement of strategies development for handling these protected marine ‘biota’ to store their population.