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Vanuatu is among the most vulnerable countries on earth to the increasing impacts of climate change, including climate-related natural disasters and the effects of slow-onset events such as sea-level rise and ocean acidification.
As the effects of global warming manifest and the hazards of climate change arise at accelerating rates, there is a need to shift the paradigm towards the standardised and mainstreamed use of science-based climate information, at multiple timescales, to support resilient development pathways.
The proposed project will support this paradigm shift through the strengthening and application of Climate Information Services (CIS) in five targeted development sectors: tourism; agriculture; infrastructure; water and fisheries.
More specifically, the project will build the technical capacity in Vanuatu to harness and manage climate data; develop and deliver practical CIS tools and resources; support enhanced coordination and dissemination of tailored information; enhance CIS information and technology infrastructure; and support the application of relevant CIS through real-time development processes, for more resilient outcomes.
The project has a focus on addressing information gaps and priority needs of target beneficiaries at national, provincial and local community levels across the five priority sectors.
The project will deliver enhanced:
capacity and capability of national development agents, to understand, access and apply CIS
CIS communications, knowledge products, tools, and resources for practical application to development processes.
reliability, functionality, utility and timeliness of underlying CIS delivery systems and data collection infrastructure.
scientific data, information and knowledge of past, present and future climate to facilitate innovated and resilient development.
Project
The Secretariat of the Pacific Environment Programme (SPREP) is implementing the Climate Information Services for Resilient Development in Vanuatu (CISRD), or Vanuatu Klaemet Infomesen blong redy, adapt mo protekt (Van-KIRAP) Project. As the first part of this project, Tonkin & Taylor International Ltd (T+TI) has been engaged to provide technical expertise on the Van KIRAP Project and the Department of Water Resources to review and update existing flood mitigation guidelines for the Sarakata catchment in Espiritu Santo Island, and to support the development of flood early warning systems in Sarakata.
This report provides a review of the existing Flood Mitigation Guidelines for Sarakata, Pepsi and Solwei Areas (2011) including the evaluation and identification of gaps in terms of early warning systems and long-term climate change considerations. The review has identified the gaps across governance, institutional arrangements, observations, risk knowledge, warning dissemination, and preparedness and response. The following recommendations are provided to address the identified gaps and to inform the development of updated flood mitigation guidelines:
• Strengthened governance and institutional arrangements, relating to:
− Strengthened policies and institutional frameworks at the provincial level including clear roles and responsibilities.
− Clear standard operating procedures for flood early warning system management. − Development of forums to enable coordination and partnerships.
− Update and finalise the Sarakata Flood Management Plan, including establishment of a monitoring and evaluation plan to ensure effective and coordinated governance of flood disaster risk reduction and to foster sustainable development.
• Strengthened observation, monitoring, analysis, and forecasting, relating to:
− Additional observational equipment and supporting services and capacity.
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Results are expected in the following areas:
R1 - Effective preparedness, response and recovery: responds to the need for national and regional response plans, end-to-end Early Warning Systems (EWS), emergency and evacuation centres, access to safe drinking water to mitigate against drought.
R2 - Strengthened institutional arrangements for DRM and CCA: responds to the need for Joint National Action Plans (JNAPs) as well as to the integration of DRM and CCA into national and sector strategies, planning and budgetary processes.
R3 - Improved knowledge, information, public awareness, training and education: the emphasis is on building awareness of risks, risk exposure through the provision of hazard and risk information through regional and local databases, strengthening human and technical capacity in a range of priority areas, production of knowledge products and related awareness.
R4 - Improved understanding of natural hazards and the reduction of underlying risks: addresses gaps in baseline scientific, technical, social and economic understanding of hazard impact and addresses underlying risks created by changing social, economic, environmental conditions and resources.
R5 - Enhanced partnerships in DRM and Climate Change: responds to the need for an integrated regional strategy for DRM and Climate Change, strengthening of the Pacific Islands Emergency Management Alliance, enhanced hazard risk management, enhances information management, facilitation of financing and integration of DRR into the work programmes of CROP agencies (Council of Regional Organizations of the Pacific).
Project
The ‘Coping with climate change in the Pacific Island Region (CCCPIR)’ programme aims to strengthen the capacities of Pacific member countries and regional organisations to cope with the impacts of climate change. The programme is funded by the government of the Federal Republic of Germany through the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and implemented through GIZ working in partnership with SPC and SPREP.
The programme commenced its activities in 2009 working with Fiji, Tonga and Vanuatu. In 2011 the program was expanded to another nine Pacific Island Countries, namely the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM), Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu and the duration has been extended until 2019. The programme brief available at http://www.spc.int/lrd/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=478&Itemid=44 gives further details.
At the regional level, the programme aligns with the Framework for Resilient Development in the Pacific (FRDP). The programme will support countries in implementing key strategic priorities in the area of climate change including, where relevant, their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), National Adaptation Programmes for Action (NAPA), National Communications to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), and other relevant national strategies, polices and plans.
The overall objective of the programme is that ‘the capacities of regional organisations in the Pacific Islands region and its member states to adapt to climate change and mitigate its causes are strengthened’. This objective will be achieved through six components highlighted below.
Component 1: Strengthening regional advisory and management capacity
Project
The Project aims to enhance Early Warning Systems (EWSs) in the Pacific SIDS (Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Timor-Leste and Vanuatu) , thereby contributing to building greater resilience to hydrometeorological hazards in the region. The proposed scope of the hazards for which EWSs will be created or enhanced is severe weather – including tropical cyclones, floods, drought and sea predictions. The warnings will be issued and acted upon hours, days, weeks and - in the case of drought - months ahead of the hazard occurring.
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The El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) drives substantial variability in tropical cyclone (TC) activity around the world1–3 . However, it remains uncertain how the projected future changes in ENSO under greenhouse warming4–8 will aect TC activity, apart from an expectation that the overall frequency of TCs is likely to decrease for most ocean basins9–11. Here we show robust changes in ENSO-driven variability in TC occurrence by the late twenty-first century. In particular, we show that TCs become more frequent (∼20–40%) during future-climate El Niño events compared with present-climate El Niño events—and less frequent during future-climate La Niña events—around a group of small island nations (for example, Fiji, Vanuatu, Marshall Islands and Hawaii) in the Pacific. We examine TCs across 20 models from the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 5 database12, forced under historical and greenhouse warming conditions. The 12 most realistic models identified show a strong consensus on El Niño-driven changes in future-climate large-scale environmental conditions that modulate development of TCs over the o-equatorial western Pacific and the central North Pacific regions. These results have important implications for climate change and adaptation pathways for the vulnerable Pacific island nations.
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A national debriefing workshop to identify lessons learned following Tropical Cyclone Pam (TC Pam) was facilitatedby the Vanuatu National Disaster Management Office (NDMO) with support from the Pacific Community (SPC) andthe European Union (EU). Technical support was also provided by SPC through the Building Safety and Resilience in the Pacific (BSRP) project and in close cooperation with sector partners. The Tropical Cyclone Pam Lessons Learned Workshop was held in Port Vila, Vanuatu, from 24 to 25 June 2015 to review key aspects of coordination, including preparation and response. This report summarises the discussions and outcomes from that workshop.
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