01 August 2025, Nadi, Fiji – The Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environmental Program (SPREP) this week supported a Global System for Mobile (GSM) Association (GSMA)-Pacific Islands Telecommunications Associations (PITA) Workshop on leveraging Cell-Broadcasting for Disaster Preparedness, Response and Recovery in Nadi, Fiji to coordinate training and planning for the roll out of Cell Broadcasting in the Cook islands, Samoa, Solomon Islands and Kiribati.
This Cell broadcasting is a partnership is between GSMA, PITA and Omnitouch, a telecom engineering firm headquartered in Melbourne, Australia with offices globally, with the aim of establishing cost effective cell broadcasting capability in the pilot countries.
Commenting on the partnership, Omnitouch founder and CEO Mr. Nick Jones says, “We are funding the implementation of cell-broadcasting initially for the four countries with the coordination support of PITA and GSMA to demonstrate what could be done with existing cell broadcasting technology to assist with getting messages out to many people immediately at using mobile phones. It is our hope that the model we are promoting can be used across the region to be able to save lives and better respond to natural disasters”.
The first country out of the four pilot countries to have this capability is the Solomon Islands. Mr. Alex Rilifia, Senior Forecaster of the Solomon Islands Meteorological Services commented on his experience.
“This Cell broadcasting is a game changer for us in the Solomon Islands. We have always had difficulties sending out warnings to our remote communities due to telecommunication challenges. There are still telecom challenges that we need to rectify, such as stable rural area mobile coverage, but this new technology is promising,” says Mr. Rilifia.
“Being able to send messages out to the wider population immediately without delay is something we never had access too. The transformational potential of this capability in our line of work is huge, and we look forward to fully operationalising the system to support the resilience of the Solomon Islands to life- and livelihood-threatening hazards”.
Mr. John Strickland, Director of Emergency Cook Islands also shared his view. “This technology is what we have been waiting for in the Cook Islands. The Cook Islands is ready, and we would like to see this implemented now.”
Also commenting on behalf of SPREP, the Manager of the Weather Ready Program, Mr. Ofa Faanunu says, “The Weather Ready Pacific Program is a Program established by the Pacific Leaders to bring transformational changes to how the Region reacts to and responds to natural hazards. Tasked by the Leaders to be a key vehicle in the implementation of the Early Warning for All Initiative (EW4ALL), Weather Ready Pacific and SPREP are pleased to support this work on operationalising cell broadcasting for the Pacific.”
He added, “The engagement of the private sector in early warning services is critical. This technology has the potential to totally reform how early warning messages are conveyed to communities. Weather Ready Pacific is therefore on standby to support its Members. We are particularly interested not only in establishing this capacity within the region as a solution for dissemination challenges, but it also needs to be sustainable in the long run.”
The five-day workshop was attended by representative from telecommunication providers, telecommunication regulators, representatives from national governments and representatives from National Hydro-Met Services (NDMOs) and National Disaster Management Offices.
Other representatives from the 4 pillars of the Early Warning for including the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), The UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR), the International Federation of Red Cross (IFRC) and the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). The Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC), SPREP, and the Pacific Islands Telecommunications Association (PITA) attended from Regional Council of Regional Organizations of the Pacific (CROP) agencies.
SPREP through the Weather Ready Pacific (WRP) Program funded by Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom and the European Union-funded Intra ACP Climate Services and Applications Programme (ClimSA) supported ten representatives from the Cook Island, Solomon and Kiribati National Meteorological Services and the National Disaster Managers to attend the workshop.
For more information, please contact Mr. ‘Ofa Faanunu, Weather Ready Pacific Program Manager, at [email protected].