Papahānaumokuākea

Overview

About

Papahānaumokuākea was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2010 as a mixed site.

Why it was inscribed

The World Heritage Committee found that it meets criteria (iii), (vi), (viii), (ix), (x) of the ten selection criteria:

(iii) a unique or at least exceptional testimony to a cultural tradition or to a civilization which is living or which has disappeared.

(vi) directly or tangibly associated with events or living traditions, with ideas or beliefs, or with artistic and literary works of outstanding universal significance.

(viii) an outstanding example of major stages of Earth’s history, including the record of life, significant on-going geological processes in the development of landforms, or significant geomorphic or physiographic features.

(ix) an outstanding example of significant on-going ecological and biological processes in the evolution and development of ecosystems and communities of plants and animals.

(x) the most important and significant natural habitats for in-situ conservation of biological diversity, including those containing threatened species of outstanding universal value.

Description (UNESCO World Heritage Centre)

Papahānaumokuākea is a vast and isolated linear cluster of small, low lying islands and atolls, with their surrounding ocean, roughly 250 km to the northwest of the main Hawaiian Archipelago and extending over some 1931 km. The area has deep cosmological and traditional significance for living Native Hawaiian culture, as an ancestral environment, as an embodiment of the Hawaiian concept of kinship between people and the natural world, and as the place where it is believed that life originates and to where the spirits return after death. On two of the islands, Nihoa and Makumanamana, there are