Pacific, Climate & Environment Profile Series: Malik Oedin

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As AFRAN celebrates 10 years of connecting people, knowledge and expertise across France, Australia and the Pacific, our Pacific, Climate & Environment Profile Series continues to showcase the people whose work is contributing to a more sustainable and resilient region. Today, we are pleased to feature Malik Oedin, a researcher and conservation practitioner from New Caledonia whose work brings together biodiversity conservation, climate adaptation, scientific research and local knowledge. Based in Koné, Malik combines several complementary roles. He is Forest District Head in New Caledonia's Northern Province, President of Gardiens des Îles, and a researcher specialising in inclusive biodiversity conservation, with particular expertise in Pacific bats. He is also the Pacific representative for the Pacific Bat Conservation Network and a contributor to the Melanesia Biocultural Network.

From nature-based to people-based solutions

At the heart of Malik's approach is a simple principle: protecting biodiversity cannot happen without the people who live alongside it. His work promotes a horizontal model of collaboration, where scientists and communities contribute on an equal footing. Local and Indigenous knowledge is not treated simply as information to be collected, but as an essential part of understanding ecosystems and designing solutions that can work in practice. This is particularly important when thinking about climate adaptation. Nature-based solutions can provide powerful responses to environmental change, but Malik argues that they cannot succeed without genuine community engagement.

As he puts it:

"In the Pacific, we need to talk not only about nature-based solutions, but also about people-based solutions."

For Malik, conservation is therefore as much about relationships, participation and knowledge-sharing as it is about ecosystems.

Connecting knowledge across the Pacific

While deeply rooted in New Caledonia, Malik's work extends across the wider Pacific. Over the years, he has developed a regional network connecting researchers, local communities, governments and institutions, with collaborations extending to Australia, New Zealand and France. His organisation has also taken its expertise beyond New Caledonia, including through a first study of bats in Wallis and Futuna and work at the Melanesian level on customary management of terrestrial natural resources. These collaborations highlight what Malik sees as one of the region's greatest opportunities: bringing together different but complementary forms of expertise. Australia and other research partners can contribute technologies, scientific methodologies and monitoring tools, while Pacific communities bring generations of local knowledge, experience and community-led approaches. The challenge—and opportunity—is to create spaces where these strengths can genuinely meet. Malik's work also embraces new tools, including the use of artificial intelligence in biodiversity research, while keeping people and communities at the centre of the process.

Cultivating the next generation

Another central dimension of Malik's approach is his commitment to young people. For him, involving the next generation means much more than inviting young people to observe existing conservation initiatives. They need opportunities to participate, gain experience, take responsibility and progressively become leaders themselves. Malik describes this philosophy through the image of a “pearl cultivator”: his role is not simply to lead, but to create the conditions in which the people he mentors can grow into the next generation of leaders—the “pearls” who will eventually take his place. It is an approach that places transmission at the heart of long-term resilience. Conservation initiatives become sustainable not only when ecosystems are protected, but when communities have the knowledge, confidence and leadership needed to continue that work into the future.

Turning connections into action

Malik's involvement with AFRAN has helped him mobilise his network and develop new connections with researchers and institutions. Those connections have also translated into projects. Drawing on AFRAN's collaborative model, he has contributed to developing Australia–Pacific partnerships and broader Indo-Pacific initiatives, demonstrating how networks can move beyond knowledge-sharing to become platforms for action.

His story reflects something fundamental to AFRAN's own approach after ten years of collaboration: some of the most effective responses to complex environmental challenges emerge when scientific expertise, technology, local knowledge and communities are brought together. For Malik, the future of Pacific biodiversity conservation will depend not only on finding better ways to protect nature, but on empowering the people who will care for it. And perhaps, above all, on cultivating the next generation of “pearls” who will lead that work in the years to come.