Building Capacity of Papua New Guinean Government to Respond to Climate Change and Engage Grassroots Structures in Development Planning for the Atolls (ATOLLS)

The proposed intervention is targeted at assisting the Government of Papua New Guinea through the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) to increase its capacity to find durable solutions to mitigate and adapt to climate change induced migration in Papua New Guinea through greater consultations and community based environmental planning. The Carterets communities of north Bougainville in Papua New Guinea (PNG) will be the focus of the first phase of this project. They reside on remote low-lying islands and have been identified by the ABG as the atolls community most in need. The Carterets community face slow-onset changes to their environment and deteriorating ecosystems, including sea water inundation, salinization of soil, soil erosion, land loss, food insecurity, increased vulnerability to natural disasters and climate variability, as well as other factors related to socio-economic and physical stressors.

This intervention aims to implement the following outputs: i) Baseline report on vulnerability and resilience levels of Carterets communities ii) Capacity building of 30 government officials in community based planning (CBP); iii) 4 CBP workshops run in 4 Carterets communities iv) 4 “Training for Transformation” (TFT) conducted in the 4 Carterets communities v) alternative livelihood strategies for affected communities implemented in 4 Carterets communities, vi) report based on new knowledge received from resilience building projects and data collection to be published and disseminated.