PCREEE Youth Initiatives Highlighted at the Pacific Resilience Meeting

3rd May 2019, Suva, Fiji. Close to four hundred people from all walks of life converged at Suva, Fiji on 30 April – 3 May for the inaugural Pacific Resilience Meeting.

Themed Youth Futures in a Resilient Pacific, the PRM is a multi-sectoral, multi-stakeholder meeting that will take stock of progress and review and strengthen operational processes relating to the implementation of the three goals of the Framework for Resilient Development in the Pacific (FRDP).  Among the goals of the PRM is to inspire leadership, partnership and ownership of the FRDP – taking ownership of our future by engaging young people and multiple stakeholders in decision-making and innovations.

Goal 2 of the FRDP is on Low Carbon Development and Day 2 of the PRM was dedicated to this goal. Manager of the PCREEE, Solomone Fifita, was in a panel to showcase current and future youth initiatives relating to low carbon development.

The PCREEE Research Support Facility is to support tertiary students’ research on sustainable energy in a Pacific Island community. The research should lead to completing their degree requirements. Three young people have made use of this facility.

The PCREEE Entrepreneurship Training Facility is to support training for youths on how to start a business relating to sustainable energy or to find employment opportunities in the sustainable energy space. PCREEE has jointly conducted such training with GGGI in Fiji, Kiribati and Vanuatu and is open to conduct similar training with youth councils in the region.

The PCREEE Business Support Facility supports the actual start-up of a sustainable energy business and promotes the engagement of local suppliers, contractors and consultants. Many enquiries have received regarding this facility.

The PCREEE Sustainable Energy Innovation Competition is to capture innovation in the tourism and industrial sector and the creativity of the primary as well as secondary school children. The competition for the school children was rolled out in Niue in mid-April and the responses were overwhelming.    

“The PCREEE is not a youth organisation but we are mindful of the key role of youths and we have programmes that are available year round for our young men and women,” concluded Fifita. 

Pacific Resilience Meeting panelists on Low Carbon Development

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