Attachments
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Tonga is a kingdom in the South Pacific. It is an archipelago comprised of 176 islands, home to a population of approximately 100,000 people, 74% of whom live on the main island, Tongatapu. While Tonga’s economy relies heavily on remittances from Tongan workers overseas and on foreign budgetary aid, it also has a productive agricultural sector, in which an estimated 64% of households engage in some way. This level of exposure to the global economy and reliance on agriculture leaves the country vulnerable to global economic shocks and to the ravages of natural disasters and climate change. Indeed, Tonga’s losses from natural disasters as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) are among the top five in the world over the last decade. Moreover, climate change is expected to exacerbate these losses. These factors have led Tonga to develop a disaster management approach that is “allhazards” and focuses on emergency support functions.
Since 2007, the National Emergency Management Office (NEMO) has been the lead office for coordinating disaster risk reduction (DRR). Since 2015, NEMO has overseen the national cluster system, which adapts the international humanitarian cluster system as advocated by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA). Tonga’s 10 clusters integrate various stakeholders, including other government agencies, non-governmental organizations (NGO), His Majesty’s Armed Forces (HMAF), and UN bodies such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and OCHA.
Passed into law in mid-2021, the Disaster Risk Management (DRM) Act was written with the goal of enhancing the legal, institutional, and regulatory framework for disaster management. Under the 2021 Act, NEMO is to become the National DRM Office, which will establish and maintain the National DRM Policy and will be the focal point for all requests and donations of relief supplies from partners, private contributors, and international organizations in times of emergency. Local DRM committees are expected to have representation of “women, young people, people with disabilities, and other vulnerable groups.”
In addition to its explicit disaster management efforts, Tonga, like many of its neighbors in the South Pacific, views climate change mitigation and climate change adaptation (CCA) as integral parts of DRR. It was the first country in the region to develop a Joint National Action Plan (JNAP) on Climate Change Adaptation and Disaster Risk Management in 2010. In 2018, the government updated the plan, JNAP2, to build a new approach in line with the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction and the Paris Agreement. Like the DRM Act of 2021, the JNAP2 promotes inclusion and empowerment of vulnerable groups.
The country’s disaster management capacity was sorely tested in early 2022 when the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha‘apai (HTHH) volcano sent a massive atmospheric pressure wave, a plume of ash, and a series of tsunamis out over Tonga and throughout the region. National and island emergency operations centers had been activated before the event, and the government declared a state of emergency, followed a few days later by a request to the UN Resident Coordinator for urgent humanitarian assistance.
The world responded. Coming as it did amidst the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, the disaster abetted Tonga’s first large-scale exposure to the disease after nearly two years of closed borders that kept the virus at bay. NEMO coordinated with international relief actors to deliver assistance through a modified, contact-free distribution system. The combined eruption, ashfall, and tsunami affected at least 85,000 people, displaced 2,400 people, and killed four people. The events affected 85% of agricultural households, and the longterm effects could include severe disruptions to fishing-based livelihoods.