The Kingdom of Tonga, situated on the Pacific tectonic plate known as the Ring of Fire, faces a significant risk from climate change. As the third most at-risk country for natural hazards and sea level rise according to the 2021 World Risk Report, Tonga was severely impacted by a volcanic eruption in January 2022 that triggered tsunami waves up to 15 meters high, resulting in the destruction of entire villages.
However, the people of Tonga are resilient and are working with the €12 million EU funded Intra-ACP GCCA+ Pacific Adaptation to Climate Change and Resilience Building (PACRES) program, in partnership with the Ministry of Meteorology, Energy, Information, Disaster Management, Environment, Climate Change and Communication (MEIDECC), to enhance their capacity to adapt to climate change and build resilience.
One of the key focuses of this work has been the development of climate change and disaster resilience information and knowledge management products to increase community awareness of the harmful impact of climate change. The products created, including brochures, posters, and pull-up banners, aim to help the public understand the impact of climate change.
A critical milestone achieved was the creation, updating, and hosting of Tonga’s climate change portal under Tonga’s Joint National Action Plan (JNAP) 1 for information, knowledge management, and sharing. The portal provides life-saving information to the community, enabling them to be better prepared for extreme weather events.
Due to COVID-19 border closures, country missions by PACRES Tonga were not possible. In the interim, two communication project officers were funded to work with the Department of Climate Change (DCC) to maintain the portal and the DCC’s database management system. They were also tasked with researching and making recommendations on the consolidation of climate change, disaster management, resilience building, and other information and data sets held by government ministries and agencies, the private sector, NGOs, and communities in Tonga. They also assisted in the development of the Department of Climate Change’s Communication Strategy.
Recently, the PACRES team travelled to Tonga to review the progress of the work and consider the next steps. They found that the Tonga Climate Change Portal has been upgraded, and the database is up to date. The Director of Climate Change Tonga, Mrs Luisa Tuiafitu Malolo, expressed gratitude for PACRES’ work in helping the Tongan people prepare for the impacts of climate change, which poses a clear and present danger to their communities.
Tonga is one of fifteen Pacific ACP countries where PACRES is building capacity to adapt to climate change and build resilience, with implementation carried out by the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) in partnership with the Department of Climate Change in the Ministry of Meteorology, Energy, Information, Disaster Management, Environment, Climate Change and Communications (MEIDECC) of the Government of Tonga. The Ring of Fire, which accounts for 75% of the world’s volcanoes and exhibits high variability in sea level over space and time, underscores the importance of the work being done to build resilience in Tonga and other Pacific ACP countries.
Source: SPREP