What Kind of Aid Does the Pacific Need? (Part 1)

This learning platform has placed its primary focus on the need to improve knowledge to increase resilience to climate change and manage risks at the community level in the Pacific. One may equate that with learning solely about the impacts of climate change, but that would be a mistake. Being resilient, as we have noted on many occasions, is about improving resilience in all sectors, be it economy, education or communications.

However, the global aid discussion figures around the impacts of climate change. What with El Niño and the hottest six months ever recorded, it is no wonder. In vulnerable countries like the Pacific islands, development discussions - with donors, development partners and within government itself - have been targeting climate change adaptation. And we get that, because time is of the essence.

But many countries in the Pacific are still classified as least developed countries (LDCs) and need a lot of development finance to ensure that issues like education, healthcare and a sustainable economy are meeting the needs of the population - with or without climate change in mind.

What it Means to be Resilient (Part 4) - Managing Natural Assets and Economic Opportunities

We’ve reached the end of our series on what it means to be resilient. In this final installment, we look at the aspects of economic opportunity and management of natural assets. When the aspects of community resilience were identified by the IFRC based on community perceptions of resilience, it was through a global aggregate of feedback. This makes this more difficult for Pacific communities because the idea of natural assets assumes a range of assets both on land and in the sea. In low lying atolls, natural assets refer almost exclusively to what is in the sea (and, of course, the sea itself). So, how can we use these criteria to understand how the SDGs can help improve community resilience in relation to limited natural resources available.

What it Means to be Resilient (Part 3) - Infrastructure and Services

Resilience. The go-to word these days to make you feel smart. Of course, you have to know what it means, and it means many things in many different contexts. We’ve been working our way through what it means for a community to be resilient, and in part three of our series, we look at infrastructure and services.

Why is infrastructure so important? It underpins service delivery. And so, the more resilient your community’s infrastructure, the more resilient your services are. For example: are roads in danger of being washed out during times of flooding? Are electrical sources protected during storms - and can electricity be generated in times of emergency? What is the backup electricity source? Are schools and other public buildings built back from the shoreline and rivers? Have gas stations been raised so that they can still be accessed during flooding? Are health centres reinforced so that they can be operational in times of crisis? Is there proper storage for potable water? What about communications? Will the community be cut off during times of crisis? And transport? Are there plans and is there capacity to stick to them?

What Does it Mean to be Resilient (Part 2) - Community Organization and Connectivity

In the first part of our series on what it means to be resilient, we focussed on the health and knowledge of the community. In part 2, we’ll look at how a community is organized and how well it is connected to surrounding communities, within the region and globally. As before, we use the SDGs to provide a frame of reference for the type of actions that can be undertaken at the community level to improve resilience and adaptation to the ever changing world.

What does it mean for a community to be ‘organized’? In this framework we take organized to mean governance and rule of law. SDG Goal 11 focuses on sustainable cities (and communities). Why? Because 95% of urban expansion in the next decades will take place in developing countries, and the Pacific is no exception. Urban areas account for 60-80% of energy consumption, while rapid urbanization puts undue pressure on freshwater supplies, on public health and the general living environment. In order to be resilient in the face of vulnerabilities and shocks such as cyclones, drought or epidemics, communities need to ensure access to safe housing.

What Does it Mean to be Resilient (Part 1) - Knowledge and Health

What does it mean to be resilient? Our parent publication, Theory in Practice, published an article recently which looked at definitions of resilience. Most were from the point of view of donors and development organizations, but the IFRC had a definition that had built upon the views and perceptions of communities worldwide. It was a breath of fresh air and we thought it would be a great place to begin to help us break down just what resilience means for communities, and what communities and local governments can do to increase their resilience to any number of shocks: climate change, disaster, health epidemics and food insecurity, to name but a few.

An MDG Recap: What Can We Learn from Where We Stumbled?

This site aims to be a resource on risk management and community resilience issues in the framework of the SDGs. But in order to understand just what needs to happen to effectively manage risk and increase resilience in the Pacific, it is important to learn from our track record on the MDGs. There were some positives, there were plenty of disappointing outcomes, and more than enough analysis of MDG results in the Pacific from which to learn in order to take steps forward in the face of climate change and increasing insecurities on a large number of issues.

Where to begin? There were 8 MDGs (compared to the 17 SDGs) and we could go through the results for each one individually. However, that has already been done (and done well, in a report by Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat. Read the full report here). Instead, we look to themes emerging from the report to help us understand why there has been failure to increase community resilience in the Pacific, and to better understand the risks that need to be ‘managed’ in order for sustainable development to actually happen.

The GCF: Catalyst for Adaptation or Business as Usual?

Everyone has questions about the Green Climate Fund. For some, it has been presented as the financial cure-all for developing countries and those most vulnerable to climate change. For others, it is just one more bureaucratic trust fund that will put international and donor interests first and developing country interests a distant second. What is interesting about the GCF is that it has received far more attention than any other development trust fund ever has, and is quite polarizing. Politics as usual, but for Pacific island governments and citizens, it is important to have a good understanding of what to expect from the Fund.

What differentiates the GCF from other climate change trust funds such as the Global Environment Facility is that it specifically reserves 50% of its funding for least developed countries (LDCs), small island states (SIDS) and Africa. It also ensures equal funding for adaptation and mitigation. The GCF was launched in 2015 to much fanfare and great expectations that the most vulnerable would be prioritized.