The Ministry of Agriculture and Waterways this week, hosted the official kick-off meeting of the Dutch Disaster Risk Reduction & Surge Support (DRRS) Fiji 2025 Mission, marking the commencement of technical collaboration between the Government of Fiji and the Kingdom of the Netherlands towards sustainable flood risk management in the Ba River Catchment.

The DRRS Programme is an initiative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management, and the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO).

The programme deploys international experts to support countries in strengthening their resilience to water-related disasters through knowledge exchange, capacity building, and the design of sustainable interventions.

The 2025 mission follows earlier engagement in the aftermath of the 2018 floods, during which the DRRS conducted a scoping mission in 2019 that provided key recommendations on flood risk management for Ba and Rakiraki.

This year's mission responds to a renewed request from the Ministry of Agriculture and Waterways to advance those recommendations through hydrodynamic modelling, data analysis, and technical capacity building.

The kick-off meeting, held at the Ministry's headquarters in Suva on Monday 3rd November, was attended by representatives from the European Union to the Pacific (EEAS), the Agence Française de Development (AFD), and the Honorary Consul of the Kingdom of the Netherlands to Fiji, Mr. Roderic Evers. The DRRS team is led by Mr. Fredrik Huthoff and comprises experts in flood risk management, river dynamics, and climate adaptation.

Over the course of the mission, the team working alongside officials from the Ministry of Agriculture and Waterways will undertake field assessments across the upper (Nadarivatu), middle (Navala), and lower (Ba City and Toge) reaches of the Ba River.

These assessments will focus on hydrological and geomorphological conditions, erosion and sedimentation processes, land-use impacts, and community vulnerabilities.

Yesterday, 5th November, a group of consultants and experts in Flood Risk Engineering, River Dynamics, together with Climate Adaptation specialist and Remote Support Water Infrastructures visited areas of concern to the communities of Ba to get first hand information.

Dr Fredrik Huthoff specializing in Water Resources and Ecosystems department based at the Institute for Water Education under the auspices of the United Nation Educational and Scientific Organization or UNESCO briefly explained the core role their team is being tasked to look into to reduce the impact of flooding in and around the Ba zone and its associated risks.

"Our role as consultants is to look at ways and means of mitigating access water runoff, spill over and over access of water during heavy rain which impacts the livelihood of the communities in and around Ba," he said.

"We travelled up to the interior of Ba at Toge and Navala village to assess runoffs from the ridge and its impact downstream towards the lower lying plains of the Ba delta. We were fully informed of the rising flood level during continuous rain in the two villages, which was not the case a few years back," he explained.

With Ba being the focus area, officials from the Ministry of Agriculture and Waterways also accompanied the experts to different geographical sites with counterparts from Energy Fiji Limited and Water Authority of Fiji project sites and the recently constructed retention Dam at the upper Ba river to collect field verification on how to mitigate access water during flooding.

"Our main objective is to formulate a report on a model for the Ba river basin and its tributaries to mitigate flooding and to reduce disaster and its risks,'' he stated.

The mission adopts a river basin approach, emphasizing the importance of understanding upstream-to-downstream interactions in developing effective and sustainable flood-risk reduction solutions.

The study will also take into account future climatic scenarios and planned hydropower developments to ensure interventions are resilient and adaptive to long-term changes.

A debriefing session will be convened in Lautoka on 7 November 2025, where preliminary findings will be presented, including the proposed modelling framework, priority intervention areas, and indicative budget requirements. The session will also identify potential national and international funding opportunities to support the implementation of flood risk mitigation measures.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Waterways reaffirms its commitment to working with international partners to strengthen climate resilience, river management, and community protection.

The collaboration with the Kingdom of the Netherlands reflects a shared vision of sustainable water governance and adaptive management in the face of increasing climate risks.<_o3a_p>

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