Papua’s Bintuni Bay is very rich with coastal resources but at the same time is faced with many problems and challenges. As part of the Indonesia Coastal Resources Management Project (CRMP), the first programmatic activity undertaken in the province was to gather both primary and secondary data needed to develop a coastal resource profile of Bintuni Bay. This task was undertaken in partnership with the University of Papua (UNIPA), local non-governmental organizations (NGOs), relevant local government agencies, the private sector, and the local communities.

Using the data collected above, the CRMP developed a coastal resource atlas of Bintuni Bay. The University of Papua (UNIPA) led the development of the atlas and a geographic GIS catalog — working along with local government and other stakeholders and CRMP mentors. Two local NGOs took the lead in conducting socio-economic surveys in Bintuni Bay. The private sector (British Petroleum) made available a data source that reduced time and cost of data acquisition. A concept on Integrated Bay Management was developed and transferred to local stakeholders. It is expected that the completion of the Bintuni Bay atlas will be followed with the development of an integrated coastal resource management program for the Regency of Bintuni in general and for Bintuni Bay specifically.

A companion to the full-scale atlas was a simpler, newspaper-format mini-atlas that was distributed to the communities and other stakeholders.