Samoa gears up for World congress

More than 4,000 delegates from over 163 countries will gather together at the Congress. Held every 10 years, the Congress is the landmark global forum on protected areas, designed to share knowledge and innovation and set the agenda for protected areas conservation for decades to come.

Samoan and Australian decision-makers, planners and scientists are working to help protect Samoa’s major infrastructure from future storm surges and coastal flooding.

With nearly three quarters of Samoans living on the coast, and one quarter in the capital city of Apia, rising sea levels pose a very real threat.

“We’re working to build resilience to climate and weather risks to low lying coastal areas, to help manage risks and protect communities,” said Samoa’s Minister of Natural Resources and Environment, Fa’amoetauloa Dr. Fa'ale Tumaali’i.

“But to date the actual information on current and future climate in the Pacific region has been limited".

“To address this gap, our Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment have been working in partnership with Australia, to capture accurate information about the low lying areas around Apia and Faleolo international airport". First, the elevation of coastal land around

Apia was measured using airborne remote sensing technology, that measures distance by illuminating a target with a laser and analysing the reflected light. This technology, known as LiDAR, gives a very accurate measurement of elevation and allows for development of a detailed three-dimensional reconstruction of the coastline.

Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (C.S.I.R.O) then undertook a detailed analysis of this data to calculate the risks of storm surge and coastal flooding from tropical cyclone events.

The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment are now using maps based on the data, which show how sea level rise will impact the Apia foreshore and Faleolo Airport.

“Our local authorities are now using this information across the board in infrastructure and urban planning,” Fa’amoetauloa said.

There is a Samoan delegation heading to the I.U.C.N World Parks Congress, Parks, people planet: inspiring solutions, being held in Sydney, Australia from 12 to 19 November.

More than 4,000 delegates from over 163 countries will gather together at the Congress.

Held every 10 years, the Congress is the landmark global forum on protected areas, designed to share knowledge and innovation and set the agenda for protected areas conservation for decades to come.

Responding to Climate Change is one of eight streams being discussed at Congress.

“Some of the key areas the Samoan delegation will certainly look forward to discussing at the Congress, will include preparedness and response strategies and partnerships towards realizing and sustaining these strategies in the short and medium term,” Chief Executive Officer of M.N.R.E, Suluimalo Amataga Penaia, said.

“To date, Samoa has made considerable progress since 2007, in climate change adaptation due largely to the successful implementation of all our nine National Adaptation Programme of Action project profiles through six different externally-funded projects. These projects have also built local capacity of government ministries and divisions as well as local communities, laying the foundation for future climate projects.”

The project to map and model coastal land around Apia is part of an ongoing partnership project between the Australian Government Department of the Environment and M.N.R.E, to assist Samoa build resilience to climate risk and natural disaster impacts in coastal areas.

The project is being delivered with funding from the Australian Government’s Pacific-Australia Climate Change Science and Adaptation Planning (P.A.C.C.S.A.P) programme.