Vanuatu: A flagship for the world
Vanuatu, often referred to as a Small Island Developing State due to its limited land area spread across 80
islands, is, in reality, a Large Ocean State with more than 680,000 km2 (larger than the Ukraine) of the Pacific
Ocean within its Exclusive Economic Zone. Its vast size and isolation, combined with high levels of poverty,
compound its climate vulnerability and thus make it more difficult to adapt to climate impacts. These impacts
include higher temperatures on both land and at sea, volatile precipitation patterns, sea-level rise, and greater
exposure to violent cyclones.1 2 All of these patterns will become more extreme over the coming decades,
leading to erosion of arable land along the coast, destruction of infrastructure, intrusion of ocean water into
agricultural areas and freshwater sources, coral reef bleaching and subsequent impacts on fish stocks, and,perhaps most importantly for an isolated Large Ocean State, a reduction in water quantity and quality.3 4
Climate adaptation is then quite literally a question of survival for citizens of Vanuatu. And, because wateris the major connecting element between the land and the sea, with rivers transporting drinking water,
pollutants and sedimentation to coastal areas while the ocean rises and strips away the coast or seeps into
freshwater supplies and farms, Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) is essential for ensuring
adaptation efforts produce immediate and long-term tangible benefits for the population’s health, and foodand livelihood security.
Indeed, Vanuatu has already seized on this fact, explicitly including IWRM in its National Adaptation Plan ofAction (NAPA) as a priority project to reduce vulnerability to climate change across the nation’s watersheds.5
Similarly, the country’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) integrates water management acrosssectors and focal areas such as forestry, gender and health, among others, citing a need for “natural resource
related measures to protect climate vulnerable urban water supplies [e.g., watershed restoration],”6 which aredependent almost entirely on limited aquifers vulnerable to seawater contamination.7

1

https://www.gfdrr.org/en/publication/climate-risk-and-adaptation-country-profile-vanuatu

2

https://climateknowledgeportal.worldbank.org/country/vanuatu/vulnerability#:~:text=According%20to%20a%201998%20
Commonwealth,earthquakes%2C%20tsunamis%2C%20and%20cyclones.

3

https://www.gfdrr.org/en/publication/climate-risk-and-adaptation-country-profile-vanuatu

4

https://www.adaptation-undp.org/projects/bf-pacc-vanuatu

5

See page 52: https://unfccc.int/resource/docs/napa/vut01.pdf

6

See page 60: https://unfccc.int/sites/default/files/NDC/2022-08/Vanuatu%20NDC%20Revised%20and%20Enhanced.pdf

7

file:///C:/Users/pc/Downloads/VUT_UNHabitat_2015_PVVA_FullReport.pdf

Recent initiatives have also contributed to thepolicy framework and enabling environment neededfor IWRM, including the GEF-LDCF funded Vanuatu
Coastal Adaptation Project (now in Phase II),
which indicated freshwater supplies as a major
climate-related concern and therefore a priority
for its adaptation measures. In focusing on water,
the project also sought to “increase the efficiency
of agriculture and fisheries, food and water
management at the local level; and improve interinstitutional coordination and local governancecapacity,”8 while identifying key entry points forwater conservation in various sectors and how
ecosystem restoration can contribute to morereliable water supplies.
Additionally, the recent “Integrated Sustainable
Land and Coastal Management” project promoted“the integrated management of watersheds
and associated landscapes in four main project
localities [Maskelyne islands, North Efate, Mystery
Island and Tongoa] in such a way as to deliver
multifocal […] benefits,”9 built on a 2009 regional
Ridge-to-Reef (R2R) programme’s efforts which
laid the foundations for future IWRM work.10 R2Rmanagement recognizes the fundamental yet
often overlooked fact that, via the force, flow, andchemistry of water, the ocean is linked to the land,and, conversely, the land to the ocean, so humanactivities in one area will affect the other. And,given the importance of water for the country, thisintegrative project helped begin mainstreaming R2Rrelated policies across various economic sectors
and in environmental planning processes while also
initiating the development and implementation of
R2R management plans for 100,000 hectares ofland.11 Unfortunately, several challenges such as a
volcanic eruption, extremely destructive cyclone,and Covid-19 arose during the project, slowing
implementation progress.
Despite those challenges, Vanuatu continues tomove forward, building on its IWRM experienceswith the new “SIDS Ecosystem Restoration FlagshipProject (SIDS Flagship)” as part of the UN Decade onEcosystem Restoration. The SIDS Flagship project,with the help of innovative finance mechanisms,12will link coastal and marine restoration initiatives
via further R2R and seascape management
mainstreaming, aiming to close inefficiencyproducing gaps stemming from conventional,
siloed resource governance approaches focusing
on only one ecosystem or sector at a time.13 For
example, the project emphasizes a “Blue Recovery” torebound from the pandemic, engaging stakeholders
at key target sites for linking R2R and seascapeplanning and management, and developing publicprivate partnerships to scale up restoration efforts.
Importantly, the project recognizes Vanuatu’sdependence on tourism (ranging between 30% to 40%of the economy, before the Covid-19 pandemic),14and focuses on the industry’s role in R2R andseascape management, emphasizing training for
decision-makers, dive shops, cruise lines, and hotels
to integrate watershed, coastal, and mangrove (i.e.,
the ecosystems stretching from ridges to reefs)
protection and restoration into development andbusiness planning, respectively.15
Whether explicitly stated or embedded within theterminology of R2R management or other resource
governance principles, IWRM features prominently
in Vanuatu’s climate change adaptation anddevelopment planning, and, in a way, reflects a returnto pre-colonial customary law, which understoodreefs to be extensions of the land.16 In this light,

8See page 53: https://www.greenclimate.fund/sites/default/files/
document/funding-proposal-fp184.pdf

12 The project will explore applicability of (Blue) carbon credits,biodiversity banking, PES for coastal protection, etc.

9

https://www.thegef.org/projects-operations/projects/5397: See
Project Document, page 2.

13 https://www.nab.vu/project/sids-ecosystem-restoration-flagshipvanuatu-comores-and-santa-lucia

10 This project was part of and build on a regional programme titled“Pacific Islands Ridge-to-Reef National Priorities: Integrated Water,Land, Forest and Coastal Management to Preserve Biodiversity,
Ecosystem Services, Store Carbon, Improve Climate Resilience andSustain Livelihoods” that began in 2009. It focused heavily on IWRM,establishing a water advisory council, flood management plan, andgeneral training related to water management for communities up
to cabinet members. See: https://www.pacific-r2r.org/sites/default/files/2020-03/Vanuatu.pdf
11 https://www.thegef.org/projects-operations/projects/5397: See FAOGEF Project Implementation Report, pages 6-7.

14 https://www.worlddata.info/oceania/vanuatu/tourism.php
15 https://www.nab.vu/sites/default/files/documents/NAB%20SOP%20
Project%20profile%20form%20final_FAO_SIDS.pdf
16 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259453003_
Traditional_Marine_Management_Areas_of_the_Pacific_in_
the_Context_of_National_and_International_Law_and_Policy/
link/54be3bcb0cf218d4a16a558a/download

Vanuatu could truly be considered a flagship forthe rest of the world to emulate, starting with thefollowing key takeaways:
1. Integrating customary knowledge and resource
governance traditions into modern, science-based
protected area management can not only enhance
ecosystem restoration and conservation but alsobuild the necessary stakeholder buy-in and longterm cooperation crucial to ensuring that thoseecosystems contribute to adaptation needs.
2. In some countries, climate impacts are already sodire that IWRM/R2R/adaptation projects’ design
should take into consideration the fact that theirproject activities could themselves be affected
directly or indirectly by a climate-induced disaster.
For example, tropical cyclone Harold, while
not directly causing damage to the Integrated
Sustainable Land and Coastal Management
project’s equipment or interventions, forced its
team to focus its resources and time on disaster
response and recovery instead of watershedmanagement and R2R implementation for theprevention of water-related disasters.

18

3. Finally, R2R and IWRM, as silo-breaking andbeneficial as they are in the long term, dorequire major initial investments in coordination
and role setting in the short term to avoid
confusion and misestimations regarding,respectively, responsibilities and related partner
implementation capacities. Project design must
make realistic estimates of time and financing
needed for coordination and role setting.17

For more information, contact Head of Freshwater Unit,
Elisabeth Bernhardt, lis.bernhardt@un.org

17 https://www.thegef.org/projects-operations/projects/5397:
See Mid-term Review

18 Adapted from: https://www.pacific-r2r.org/sites/default/
files/2020-03/Vanuatu.pdf