Enhancing adaptive capacity of communities to climate change-related floods in the North Coast and Islands Region of Papua New Guinea

Papua New Guinea is susceptible to a host of natural disasters whose impact is projected to intensify with the onset of climate change. Worsening tropical storms, cyclones, drought, and even hailstorms in the highlands have already imposed setbacks to the country, its economy, environment, and basic human development needs. In the North Coast and the Islands regions of Papua New Guinea, home to a total of nearly 2.6 million people, flooding–both coastal and inland–is the most important climate-change related hazard, threatening coastal communities, key economic centers, and provincial capitals.

The project, a joint undertaking by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Papua New Guinea’s Office of Climate Change and Development, will focus on helping both the government and residents of the riverine North Coast and the coastal Islands communities make informed decisions about how best to plan and respond to a coastal or inland flood. The coastal flooding component aims to establish a coastal early warning system for observation, data collection and information management and dissemination in the provinces of the North Coast and Islands Region; coastal flood preparedness and response plans and systems; and a support system for community-led mangrove reforestation and conservation projects. The inland flooding component will focus on river communities and set up early warning systems for observation, data collection and information management and dissemination in the North Coast provinces. It would also establish an inland flood preparedness and response plan and systems in Oro Province, as well as integrated riverbank protection measures across four provinces.

Other project components include the incorporation of climate- and disaster-related risk policies into coastal zone policy-making and legal frameworks at the national and sub-national levels, as well as training for government employees at all levels to implement these policies and plans. The project will also work to promote ownership of adaptation and climate change-related risk reduction processes at national and sub-national levels through awareness-raising, and education.  Lessons learned and best practices would be dissemminated to domestic communities, civil society, policy makers in government and to other countries and international actors working toward similar goals.