Paul Cox & Fuiono Senio

Paul Cox and Fuiono Senio worked to preserve a 30,000-acre Samoan rainforest by developing economic alternatives for villagers who saw the forest as their only source for income.

Despite great biological diversity, throughout the entire South Pacific less than 0.1% of terrestrial habitats have any form of protection. The village of Falealupo on Savai’i Island in Western Samoa controls some of the largest tracts of lowland rainforest remaining in all of Polynesia.

In 1988, the Samoan government informed villagers that a new schoolhouse was needed, or teachers would no longer be available to instruct their children. Because annual per capita income in Falealupo is less than $100, the village leaders felt they had no choice but to sell part of their rainforest to pay for the new school.

Paul Cox, an American botany professor, had been studying the forest ecology of Samoa. He first learned of Falealupo’s plight when he heard the bulldozers in the bush beyond the village. Though an academic by training and without any fundraising experience, he immediately went to the village chiefs and asked if they would put a halt to the logging if he could raise the money needed to build the school. Because Samoans have often been taken advantage of by Westerners, the offer from an American professor was difficult to accept. Furthermore, according to Samoan custom, all decisions have to be made by the unanimous agreement of village leaders.