A new report says 3.8 million school-age children in the Pacific are at risk of missing out on education as a result of climate change, disasters and emergencies

Like many mothers, Janet Iaticknu gets up in the morning and helps her children get ready for school.

However, these days, her five children are home by noon because she does not have enough food for their lunches.

Iaticknu lives on Tanna island in Vanuatu, where in February two category four cyclones swept through the area, destroying homes, displacing families and uprooting crops.

“We do not have balanced meals in our home because the crops were all damaged,” she said.

“What we have in our home now is just cassava and coconut milk on top, or just boiled rice and just a tin of tuna or something like that.”

While the children’s school building still stands, teachers only offer half-day classes.

Iaticknu’s children walk about an hour to school, and the still-muddy roads make their journey longer and harder.

“They cannot walk to school every day,” she said. “It is raining and it is very hard.”

A new report by humanitarian organisation Plan International has highlighted the impact of emergencies and protracted crises on children and young people’s education, with a focus on the Pacific.

The report says all 3.8 million school-age children in the Pacific are at risk of missing out on education as a result of climate change, disasters and emergencies. 

“Without access to education, the risk is that you are missing out on an entire generation of children and their capacity to contribute to your economy and your society,” Plan International chief executive Susanne Legena said.

Legena said disasters disrupted learning in the short- and long-term. 

“We know that, from the tropical cyclone in Fiji in 2021, there were 100 schools damaged [and] children are still learning in makeshift tents,” she said.

With sea levels predicted to rise at alarming rates over the coming 30 years, the report said, climate change-related migration and the inundation of schools in low-lying coastal regions was a real threat.

The report highlighted that about two-thirds of people in Vanuatu and Solomon Islands live within 1 kilometre of the coast.

Meanwhile, it noted, girls were less likely to return to school than boys would after disasters had interrupted their education. 

“At least a third of girls may not return to school once they are taken out of school and put on doing chores at home or employed in helping their families in other ways,” Legena said.

Disasters also exacerbate existing issues for girls in the region, such as high rates of teenage pregnancy and low secondary school completion rates, the report found.

Flora Vano from women’s rights NGO ActionAid in Vanuatu said she was worried about the report’s findings and what might happen to her community.

“I am scared. I am really frightened of the words that I am saying right now, because I need people to start realising that this is not only something written on a report on a paper. This is [also] the reality we are living in,” she said.

Vano said many schools in Vanuatu were still flooded or damaged from February’s twin cyclones and offering reduced classes.

“[They have] no food to carry a snack to school, and their classrooms have been covered in water and most of their roofs have been blown off,” she said.

“Many schools can only house probably two classes, but the rest of them have to be at home.

“We do have some [teaching] modules or packages that can be sent home with the kids, but some of the parents are illiterate. They cannot help their kids when the package reaches them.”

Plan International said it wanted aid donors, including Australia, to boost their education funding in the region to help children access learning.

“The report actually highlights the need for us to … [to tell donors that] access to education is vital for children affected by crisis,” Plan International’s Pacific Disaster Risk Management manager, Fiji,” Joseph Lalabalavu said.

With exams fast approaching, Iaticknu hopes schooling for her five children soon returns to normal in Tanna. 

“We know our children can be successful, but if there are no full-day classes, I do not think they will be successful at the end of the year,” she said.

This story was written by Dubravka Voloder, originally published at ABC Pacific on 23 April 2023, reposted via PACNEWS.