SUVA, Fiji\u2014The Pacific Community (SPC) is offering its prayers and practical assistance as Fiji rallies to assess the scale of the impact of tropical cyclone Winston.<\/p>\n
The Pacific Community Director-General, Dr. Colin Tukuitonga, has written to Fiji\u2019s Foreign Affairs Minister, the Hon. Ratu Inoke Kubuabola, offering to deploy specialist SPC teams to assist the Fiji Government\u2019s response, based on the nation\u2019s needs in the wake of the powerful cyclone.<\/p>\n
Tukuitonga said the 390 SPC staff based in Fiji are believed to be safe, although the homes of several employees are known to be damaged, with one colleague in the Lautoka area losing the roof off his home. <\/p>\n
SPC\u2019s offices in Fiji\u2014in Suva, Lautoka and Labasa\u2014are closed today. <\/p>\n
\u201cAs per our long-standing practice in this disaster-prone region, the Pacific Community stands ready to deploy disaster response teams and provide technical assistance as needed to reinforce the Fiji Government\u2019s capacity,\u201d Tukuitonga said. <\/p>\n
\u201cOur thoughts and prayers are with the government and people of Fiji, including our many colleagues and development partners who are based there,\u201d Tukuitonga said. <\/p>\n
While the extent of damage at SPC offices and project sites is yet to be determined, Tukuitonga confirmed the globally-significant tissue culture collections at SPC\u2019s Centre for Pacific Crops and Trees in Suva are unaffected, as the building is intact and there is a back-up generator maintaining the temperature in the storage laboratories. (SPC)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" SUVA, Fiji\u2014The Pacific Community (SPC) is offering its prayers and practical assistance as Fiji rallies…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[9892,9893,9894,166],"class_list":["post-221519","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","tag-colin-tukuitonga","tag-fiji-government","tag-ratu-inoke-kubuabola","tag-spc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221519","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=221519"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221519\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=221519"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=221519"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=221519"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}