20th October 2016 Tonga was amongst 8 island countries across the region underwent capacity building with SPREP and National Red Cross Societies together with their Met Services and Disaster Management Offices. The objective of the three day capacity building workshop was to capture lessons learned from the FINPAC Component 2 of the FINPAC project in the region. The FINPAC project implemented to help reduce vulnerability in Pacific communities.
The FINPAC project implemented in Tonga is a partnership Pilot Project implemented on the remote island of Mo’unga’one in Ha’apai Island by the Government of Tonga, through its Meteorology and Emergency Managements Departments, Tonga Red Cross, Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPREP), Government of Finland (through the FINPAC Project) and UNESCO. The initiative was aimed at reducing the vulnerability of the Mounga’one Community livelihoods to Climate Change and Natural Disasters through improved meteorology and early warning system. The project identified Mounga’one Community as the worst affected island during the Tropical Cyclone Ian which devastated Ha’apai in 2014. The vision is that at the completion of the project Mounga’one will be the most resilient island in the kingdom to the impact of climate change and all natural disasters and that lessons learnt will be replicated in other vulnerable areas of Tonga.
With this being the very first community based resilience activity working in partnership with the Pacific Met Services across the region, how to replicate and strengthen the successes to allow for continuation is now on the agenda. “Our collective efforts over these three days helped us to replicate this approach used during the FINPAC Project with improvements so our Pacific region benefits through having resilience communities with improved weather, climate and early warning systems,” said Dr Netatua Pelesikoti, Director of Climate Change, SPREP. “The strong partnerships formed through this project, working together to bring about positive changes and a strengthened resilience has been a major contributing factor to the success of FINPAC.
Pacific Meteorological Staff completed a range of different activities which enhanced their capabilities, helps strengthen accuracy and receipt of information, to communications and media training to ensure information is shared so people can understand and prepare accordingly. Furthermore, activities, exchange of information and lessons learnt helped members plan way forward using the approach used through the FINPAC, resources and identified pending activities in their respective countries. All activities within the FINPAC project were to be identified at the end of the workshop and Tonga team were able to identify gaps and activities pending and agreed on timelines for the completion of activities before the end of the project.
The FINPAC Project ends in December 2016, with a wide range of resources and materials to be developed and released. The FINPAC Practitioners workshop was held in Nadi, Fiji 12 – 14 October, 2016. Participants attending the three day workshop at the Tanoa International Hotel are from the Cook Islands, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu, along with partners – SPREP, IFRC, and the World Meteorological Organization.
For further information please contact the Meteorology Division on 35355 or metstaff@met.gov.to. More information is also available at www.met.gov.to
Issued by the: Ministry of Meteorology, Energy, Information, Disaster Management, Environment, Climate Change and Communications