Papahānaumokuākea

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Papahānaumokuākea: A Unique and Significant Marine Protected Area

Papahānaumokuākea, officially recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2010, is a remarkable marine national monument located approximately 250 kilometers northwest of the main Hawaiian Archipelago. Spanning over 1931 kilometers, this expansive region includes ten small, low-lying islands and atolls, along with their surrounding ocean, making it one of the largest marine protected areas (MPAs) globally.

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UNESCO Description of the World Heritage Site

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 archaeological remains relating to pre-European settlement and use. Much of the monument is made up of pelagic and deepwater habitats, with notable features such as seamounts and submerged banks, extensive coral reefs and lagoons. It is one of the largest marine protected areas (MPAs) in the world.

UNESCO Justification of the World Heritage Site

Criterion (iii): The well preserved heiau shrines on Nihoa and Mokumanamana, and their associated still living traditions are both distinctive to Hawai’i but, positioned within a wider 3,000 year old Pacific/Polynesian marae-ahu cultural continuum, they can be seen as an exceptional testimony to the strong cultural affiliation between Hawai’i, Tahiti and the Marquesas, resulting from long periods of migration.

Criterion (vi): The vibrant and persistent beliefs associated with Papahānaumokuākea are of outstanding significance as a key element in Pacific socio-cultural evolutionary patterns of beliefs and provide a profound understanding of the key roles that ancient marae-ahu, such as those found in Raiatea, the ‘centre’ of Polynesia, once fulfilled. These living traditions of the Hawaiians that celebrate the natural abundance of Papahānaumokuākea and its association with sacred realms of life and death, are directly and tangibly associated with the heiau shrines of Nihoa and Mokumanamana and the pristine islands beyond to the north-west.

Criterion (viii): The property provides an illustrating example of island hotspot progression, formed as a result of a relatively stationary hotspot and stable tectonic plate movement. Comprising a major portion of the world’s longest and oldest volcanic chain, the scale, distinctness and linearity of the manifestation of these geological processes in Papahānaumokuākea are unrivalled and have shaped our understanding of plate tectonics and hotspots. The geological values of the property are directly connected to the values in Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park and World Heritage property and jointly present a very significant testimony of hotspot volcanism.

Criterion (ix): The large area of the property encompasses a multitude of habitats, ranging from 4,600 m below sea level to 275 m above sea level, including abyssal areas, seamounts and submerged banks, coral reefs, shallow lagoons, littoral shores, dunes, dry grasslands and shrublands and a hypersaline lake. The size of the archipelago, its biogeographic isolation as well as the distance between islands and atolls has led to distinct and varied habitat types and species assemblages. Papahānaumokuākea constitutes a remarkable example of ongoing evolutionary and bio-geographical processes, as illustrated by its exceptional ecosystems, speciation from single ancestral species, species assemblages and very high degree of marine and terrestrial endemism. For example, a quarter of the nearly 7,000 presently known marine species in the area are endemic. Over a fifth of the fish species are unique to the archipelago while coral species endemism is over 40%. As many species and habitats remain to be studied in detail these numbers are likely to rise. Because of its isolation, scale and high degree of protection the property provides an unrivalled example of reef ecosystems which are still dominated by top predators such as sharks, a feature lost from most other island environments due to human activity.

Criterion (x): The terrestrial and marine habitats of Papahānaumokuākea are crucial for the survival of many endangered or vulnerable species the distributions of which are highly or entirely restricted to the area. This includes the critically endangered Hawaiian Monk Seal, four endemic bird species (Laysan Duck, Laysan Finch, Nihoa Finch and Nihoa Millerbird, and six species of endangered plants such as the Fan Palm. Papahānaumokuākea is a vital feeding, nesting, and nursery habitat for many other species, including seabirds, sea turtles and cetaceans. With 5.5 million sea birds nesting in the monument every year and 14 million residing in it seasonally it is collectively the largest tropical seabird rookery in the world, and includes 99% of the world’s Laysan Albatross (vulnerable) and 98% of the world’s Black-footed Albatross (endangered). Despite relatively low species diversity compared to many other coral reef environments, the property is thus of very high in situ biodiversity conservation value.

Encyclopedia Record: Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument

The Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument is a World Heritage listed U.S. national monument encompassing 583,000 square miles (1,510,000 km2) of ocean waters, including ten islands and atolls of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. It was created in June 2006 with 140,000 square miles (360,000 km2) and expanded in August 2016 by moving its border to the limit of the exclusive economic zone, making it one of the world's largest protected areas. It is internationally known for its cultural and natural values as follows: 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, Nīhoa and Mokumanamana, there are archaeological remains relating to pre-European settlement and use. Much of the monument is made up of pelagic and deepwater habitats, with notable features such as seamounts and submerged banks, extensive coral reefs and lagoons.

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IUCN World Heritage Outlook

The 2025 Conservation Outlook on Papahānaumokuākea reports the following assessment:

Source: International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) · View assessment