SAMOA’S NEW NEOC HEADQUARTERS; A FIRST IN THE PACIFIC
By: Joshua Lafoa’i
Samoa is the first Pacific Island country to have a centralized emergency operation center headquarters with the dedication of the National Emergency Operation Center (NEOC) at Tu’anaimato last week.
The Center is the final product of a united engagement by the Ministry of Finance (MOF) and the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, (MNRE) through the Pacific Resilience Project, (PREP).
The Projects’ overall objective is to strengthen early warning, resilient investments and financial project in Samoa.
And PREP’s four components includes;
• Strengthening Early Warning and Preparedness
• Risk Reduction and Resilient Investments
• Disaster Risk Financing
• Project Management.
The initial participants for PREP’s First 5 year phase includes;
• Tonga
• Marshall Islands
• Vanuatu
• Samoa
In dedicating the new two-storey headquarters, Prime Minister and MNRE Minister Tuilaepa Dr. Sailele Malielegaoi in his address acknowledged that this is a vision which has been under the Government’s microscope since the Cyclone Ofa and Val in 1990 and 1991 respectively.
“It is a must that Samoa has a central office that our people will turn to when disaster strikes. Before the NEOC was formed, our people have been going through various directions to this ministry and that ministry, but now, we have a central location where all national emergency services will be centralized to effectively respond at times of natural disasters,” he said.
The $6.4million tala building is a state of the art structure equipped with the latest technology to assist the NEOC team response during natural disasters and disease pandemic control.
It is fitted with a state of the art emergency radio network, an emergency operation center, backup generator, independent water supply from 10,000 liter water tanks.
“This infrastructure will boost the job performed by the NEOC to increase the resilience of Samoa and the Pacific region as a whole to natural hazards such as cyclones, coastal/riverine flooding, volcanoes, tsunamis and earthquakes by improving the quality of forecasting and warning services.
The NEOC Headquarters is funded by the World Bank through an International Development Association (IDA) grant.
The design and blueprint for the emergency center was drawn by the Kramer Ausenco (Samoa) Ltd contractors, and was constructed by the Zheng (Samoa) Company Ltd who won the bid for the construction tender.
