Action urgent for Pacific region to ‘Stay Alive and Thrive’

Waipapa Taumata Rau, University of Auckland has lent its voice and mana to the Pacific Climate Change Roundtable currently underway in Samoa.

The event’s theme for 2025 of ‘1.5 to Stay Alive and Thrive’ reflects the region’s focus on avoiding the global average temperature going beyond 1.5⁰C, to ensure the region’s survival.

Organised by the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) the University’s Pacific Business Development Director, Willem (Pedro) Van Der Ent, and Pro Vice-Chancellor Pacific Professor Jemaima Tiatia-Siau are attending the three-day event in Apia, 13 – 15 August.

Van Der Ent says the roundtable is an invaluable opportunity for countries to come together and share their issues and success stories. He says it’s important for the University to play a role, given the new methods and innovations required to bring about interventions to help Pacific peoples and communities thrive.

“We’re here to work collaboratively to exchange knowledge and ideas on potential approaches to address both national and regional priorities around the areas of vulnerability our Pacific communities face from the impacts of climate change,” Van Der Ent says.

The University hosted SPREP’s inaugural Oceania Seabird Symposium earlier this year and Van Der Ent says the climate roundtable is another opportunity to build on the relationship.

“As a Pacific region we face unique issues and challenges, however we have the leadership, knowledge and the benefit of lived experience to come up with solutions, to mitigate the impact of climate change, and ensure the survival of our Pacific peoples.”

Tiatia-Siau emphasised the importance of supporting the region and fostering relationships to ensure collaborative approaches could be effective.

“We’re here to show our support, to meaningfully and purposefully engage, and to give the benefit of our knowledge, and vice versa, to ensuring the region can thrive.

“It is a critical opportunity for us to identify gaps where our university researchers and students may work in collaboration with SPREP to help grow Pacific research capacity and capability and breathing life into our inaugural Pacific strategy – Ala o le Moana; fundamentally activating the reciprocal nature of what it is to be Pacific and our ways of knowing, doing and being,” says Tiatia-Siau.

SPREP Director General Sefanaia Nawadra highlights the need for genuine dialogue, through more open and informal discussions. He says it is crucial to break down silos and take a multifaceted approach across a range of sectors to effectively address climate change.

The inaugural Pacific Youth Dialogue on Loss and Damage preceded the roundtable. Youth Dialogue representative and Miss Pacific Litara Ieremia Allan gave voice to the first generation to be raised during the climate crisis. Allan says youth warn that any delays to taking action will deepen losses already being felt – including disappearing shorelines, displacement, loss of income, and cultural erosion.

She says her peers are the rising tide of Pacific nations - unshaken by fear, strengthened by hope and united to protect their homelands.

The roundtable is attended by Pacific governments, youth, academia, non-governmental organisations, and the private sector. Interactive activities encourage those attending to share experiences, bolster networks and initiate new partnership opportunities.