The environment of Vanuatu including its land based resources are extremely vulnerable to climate-related hazards, such as cyclones strong wind gusts, droughts, heats spells, floods and sea level rise/storm surges. Most of these hazards are precipitated by natural weather phenomena and therefore will be exacerbated by the current and future impacts of climate change. This vulnerability is a threat not only to the livelihoods of the people of Vanuatu but also to a healthy and prosperous nation.

Set of posters that guves awareness of climate change and its impacts and adaptations.

Vanuatu is one of the most vulnerable countries in the world to natural hazards.  Situated in the Pacific’s ‘ring of fire’ and ‘cyclone belt’, it regularly experiences volcanic eruptions, earthquakes,   cyclones and at times tsunamis, drought and flood.  With the onset of climate change, extreme weather events are increasing in frequency and intensity, and sea levels are rising.

Scientist say climate change is already happening and temperatures will go on rising. They expect more extreme and more erratic weather. Sea levels will rise. hundreds of millions of poor people countries will be hit hardest.

The Pacific Islands region is experiencing climate change. Key indicators of the changing
climate include rising carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, rising air and sea temperatures,
rising sea levels and upper-ocean heat content, changing ocean chemistry and increasing
ocean acidity, changing rainfall patterns, decreasing base flow in streams, changing
wind and wave patterns, changing extremes, and changing habitats and species distributions.
Currently, the most vulnerable areas include low islands (atoll islands and other

Climate Change in the Pacific is a rigorously researched, peer-reviewed scientific assessment of the climate of the western Pacific region. Building on the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, this two volume publication represents a comprehensive resource on the climate of the Pacific.

As part of the preparedness towards any forthcoming disasters and continuous monitoring of the agricultural sector, the RRU in collaboration with FAO and DARD have established an early warning early action system that is run by the Risk and Resilience Unit (RRU) of the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Forestry, Fisheries and Biosecurity (MALFFB) to the agricultural extension officers. The department of agriculture has a total of 45 extension officers that are based on all of the 6 provinces covering almost all the area councils of every island.

This report uses these generic methods to provide recommendations for climate resilient development in the PICs in the following sectors: coastal protection, flood management, water resources management, protection of infrastructure against changes in temperature and precipitations, protection of buildings against cyclone winds, and adaptation in the agriculture sector.

This Urban Risk Management Strategy (the URMS or the Strategy) provides a response to the hazards,  risks and urban growth trends identified for Vanuatu’s two urban areas, the greater Port Vila Urban Area and Luganville. It is Stage 3 of the Risk Mapping and Planning for Urban Preparedness Project (the Project) being undertaken by the Vanuatu Meteorology and Geo-Hazards Department (VMGD) as part of the broader Mainstreaming Disaster Risk Reduction Project.

Following TC Pam NDMO recognised the need for enhanced community based disaster risk management responses. As such over the last year NDMO has been working with its key in country partners to review, revise and update certain processes and tools. One of those DRM processes and tools is the community based disaster assessment process.

The Climate Council is an independent, crowd-funded organisation providing quality information on climate change to the Australian public. This factsheet contains useful information about the influence of climate change on tropical cyclones, coastal flooding, storm surges, etc.

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.

Vanuatu is one of the most vulnerable countries to natural hazards on the planet, (World Bank, 2011). More than three quarters of the population are at risk from not just one, but multiple disaster events, including: tsunamis, volcano eruptions, flooding, cyclones and many more. According to the Pacific Catastrophic Risk Assessment and Financing Initiative (PCRAFI), undertaken by SPC and World Bank in 2010, Vanuatu can lose up to VT4 Billion in one year due to cyclone and earthquakes.

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.

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.