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This past October on the island of Lifou, a ancient-style canoe was launched into the turquoise waters – a simple gesture that signified a highly meaningful moment.

It was the first launch of a ancestral vessel on Lifou in living memory, an occasion that united the island’s primary tribal groups in a rare show of unity.

Mariner and advocate Aile Tikoure was behind the launch. For the past eight years, he has overseen a project that aims to revive traditional boat making in New Caledonia.

Many heritage vessels have been constructed in an project intended to reunite Indigenous Kanak people with their oceanic traditions. Tikoure explains the boats also facilitate the “beginning of dialogue” around maritime entitlements and environmental policies.

Diplomatic Efforts

In July, he travelled to France and conferred with President Emmanuel Macron, pushing for maritime regulations shaped with and by native populations that honor their relationship with the sea.

“Previous generations always traveled by water. We abandoned that practice for a period,” Tikoure says. “Today we’re reclaiming it again.”

Canoes hold significant historical importance in New Caledonia. They once stood for travel, exchange and family cooperations across islands, but those traditions declined under foreign occupation and outside cultural pressures.

Cultural Reclamation

His journey started in 2016, when the New Caledonia heritage ministry was looking at how to reintroduce traditional canoe-building skills. Tikoure partnered with the government and following a two-year period the canoe construction project – known as Project Kenu Waan – was born.

“The biggest challenge wasn’t harvesting timber, it was persuading communities,” he notes.

Project Achievements

The Kenu Waan project aimed to restore traditional navigation techniques, mentor apprentice constructors and use vessel construction to enhance cultural identity and regional collaboration.

To date, the team has created a display, released a publication and facilitated the building or renovation of nearly three dozen boats – from Goro to Ponerihouen.

Natural Resources

Different from many other oceanic nations where forest clearing has diminished lumber availability, New Caledonia still has suitable wood for carving large hulls.

“Elsewhere, they often use synthetic materials. Locally, we can still carve solid logs,” he says. “That represents all the difference.”

The canoes created under the Kenu Waan Project integrate traditional boat forms with local sailing systems.

Educational Expansion

Starting recently, Tikoure has also been instructing seafaring and ancestral craft methods at the local university.

“For the first time ever this knowledge are offered at advanced education. It’s not theory – this is knowledge I’ve personally undertaken. I’ve sailed vast distances on these vessels. I’ve experienced profound emotion doing it.”

Pacific Partnerships

He voyaged with the members of the Fijian vessel, the heritage craft that traveled to Tonga for the oceanic conference in 2024.

“Throughout the region, including our location, we’re part of a collective initiative,” he says. “We’re taking back the sea as a community.”

Political Engagement

This past July, Tikoure journeyed to the European location to share a “Traditional understanding of the sea” when he conferred with Macron and additional officials.

Before state and international delegates, he advocated for cooperative sea policies based on Kanak custom and local engagement.

“It’s essential to include these communities – especially fishing communities.”

Modern Adaptation

Currently, when navigators from throughout the region – from the Fijian islands, Micronesia and Aotearoa – arrive in Lifou, they examine vessels together, modify the design and eventually sail side by side.

“We don’t just copy the old models, we enable their progression.”

Integrated Mission

In his view, teaching navigation and advocating environmental policy are connected.

“The fundamental issue involves public engagement: who has the right to move across the sea, and who determines what happens there? Traditional vessels function as a means to start that conversation.”