Suva, Fiji – The Pacific Community (SPC) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on 14 May to better coordinate how they support Pacific countries responding to climate-driven disasters, displacement and human mobility.
Pacific island states are managing overlapping challenges from extreme weather, coastal erosion and growing mobility. At least 50,000 Pacific Islanders are being displaced every year by disasters, and the impacts of climate change each year, according to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre.
The Director-General of SPC, Dr Paula Vivili and IOM’s Chief of Mission and Sub-Regional Coordinator for the Pacific, Mr Solomon Kantha, signed the MoU, which links SPC’s technical work with IOM’s mandate on climate change-related mobility, to address jointly human mobility, risk knowledge, and joint capacity-building.
“Pacific leaders set out a clear direction in 2023 when they endorsed the Pacific Regional Framework on Climate Mobility. This signing gives us a practical basis to work with IOM on what that framework asks of us: rights-based, people-centred support for countries managing both the right to stay in place and the realities of displacement and migration,” said DG Vivili.
He added, “Pacific countries would benefit from a more coordinated and integrated support on issues like climate displacement. In practical terms, this should mean joint training, shared analysis, and programmes designed together rather than running in parallel.”
Mr. Kantha said closer alignment between regional and global actors was increasingly important as Pacific countries faced overlapping pressures from climate-induced migration.
“Pacific mobility has always been adaptive, but climate change is changing both its scale and its urgency,” said Mr. Kantha. “This MoU brings together migration and displacement into the same regional response, rather than running it as a separate track, while also creating opportunities to align efforts on migration statistics for development, including the use of data to better inform migration related policy, planning, and resource allocation.”
Pacific governments continue to call for faster and more coordinated delivery from their partners. This MoU is one of several SPC has signed with UN agencies and regional partners in recent years, and similarly, IOM has signed a number of MoUs with Pacific regional organizations in recent years.
Pacific Leaders endorsed the Pacific Regional Framework on Climate Mobility in 2023, the world’s first regional framework on climate change-driven movement, which calls for increased investment to match greater adaptation needs, and closer collaboration between governments and regional and international organisations on planned relocation, migration and displacement.
About IOM
The International Organization for Migration (IOM) is the leading UN-related agency dedicated to promoting safe, orderly, and humane migration, established in 1951. Based in Geneva and headed by Director General Amy Pope, IOM works with partners to provide operational assistance to migrants, refugees, and internally displaced persons worldwide.
