Results for Development

CoViD-19’s effects on health, jobs and economies are simply an acute version of what climate change is predicted to bring – and in places already has. Unless we aspire to a better normal with recovery, we are treating the symptom, not the disease. We must build back better than before. For example, it may be tempting to scale up funds for infrastructure like roads, but that funding can go to improved and greener public transport systems to service more people. More public transit capacity will reduce the load on roads and reduce air pollution and emissions. Investment in IT can decentralize business operations, reducing time lost and carbon produced in commutes and travel. By Armida Alisjahbana and Inger Andersen.

The big development issues facing the Pacific region will be debated in a new discussion series called ‘Future Pasifika’, with the first panel on healthy oceans set for July 15, broadcast worldwide from the University of the South Pacific Suva campus in partnership with the World Bank Group.

With a dire warning that, “If we do not act now, by 2050, 90% of the region’s coral reefs will be dead, and there will be no commercially exploitable wild fish stocks left,” the President of the Asian Development Bank, Mr Takehiko Nakao, launched an ‘Action Plan for Healthy Oceans and Sustainable Blue Economies for Asia and the Pacific’ yesterday, 3 May in Fiji. By Pesi Fonua.

Nuku'alofa business woman, Malia Tu'inukuafe Tonga, the new President of Women in Sustainable Enterprises Tonga Inc. (WISE) said she was overwhelmed by how women from different sectors of the economy were able to come together at the WISE Annual General Meeting last night on August 1.

Siale 'Emeline 'Ilolahia, head of the Civil Society Forum of Tonga received an inaugural Jose Edgardo Campos Collaborative Leadership Award in Washington D.C on 7 March.

Tonga's new government office block, St George Palace at Pangai Si’i, is emerging from its scaffolding wraps in the Nuku’alofa Central Business District, as constuction nears completion.

Only 20% of households in the Pacific Islands have access to electricity, and electricity prices in the region are among the highest in the world, the Pacific Power Association Conference in Nuku’alofa, Tonga, was reminded yesterday. Keynote speaker, Kamleshwar Khelawan pointed out that more clarity in governance areas would help to encourage private sector confidence and much needed investment partnerships in the energy sector.

Sione Talanoa Fifita says: "I admire the PM for acknowleding his sympathy with the flood victims and at least he was honest with his response, despite the fact he is not proactive enough. The global most concern now is climate change and he should have been forecasted that such natural disaster would occur and be proactive to put aside a proportion of the budget for such occurrence." Read 21 other comments on lack of funding for flooding...

The Tonga Development Bank has won international recognition for offering financial services that are supporting small income generating projects among disadvantaged and low-income earners in Tonga.