White, I.; Falkland, T.; Kula, T. National Versus Local Sustainable Development Plans and Island Priorities in Sanitation: Examples from the Kingdom of Tonga. Sustainability2020, 12, 9379.
White, I.; Falkland, T.; Kula, T. National Versus Local Sustainable Development Plans and Island Priorities in Sanitation: Examples from the Kingdom of Tonga. Sustainability 2020, 12, 9379.
White, I.; Falkland, T.; Kula, T. National Versus Local Sustainable Development Plans and Island Priorities in Sanitation: Examples from the Kingdom of Tonga. Sustainability2020, 12, 9379.
White, I.; Falkland, T.; Kula, T. National Versus Local Sustainable Development Plans and Island Priorities in Sanitation: Examples from the Kingdom of Tonga. Sustainability 2020, 12, 9379.
Abstract
Sanitation, water supply and their governance remain major challenges in many Pacific Island Countries. National sustainable development strategies (NSDSs) are promoted throughout the Pacific as overarching improved governance instruments to identify priorities, plan solutions and fulfill commitments to sustainable development. Their relevance to local village-level development priorities is uncertain. The Kingdom of Tonga provides opportunities to compare both. Tonga’s Strategic Development Frameworks (TSDFI 2011-2014 and TSDFII 2015-2025) were developed to focus government and its agencies on national outcomes. From 2007 to 2016, 136 villages throughout Tonga’s five Island Divisions (IDs) formulated Community Development Plans (CDPs) involving separately 80% of women, youth and men in each village. Censuses in 2006 and 2016 show linked improvements in water supply and sanitation systems but reveal IDs with continuing challenges. Sanitation and water are prominent in TSDFI but absent from the current TSDFII. In contrast, CDPs show in one ID, 53% of villages ranked sanitation as a priority with marked differences between IDs and between women, youth and men. CDPs’ sanitation priorities in IDs mostly correspond to sanitation and water metrics in the Censuses, but some reflect impacts of natural disasters. Explanations for differences in sanitation priorities between national and local development plans, as well as suggestions for improving NSDS processes in island countries, are advanced.
Keywords
sustainable development strategies; community development plans; small island developing states; governance; sanitation; water supply; hygiene; WASH; census results; top-down versus bottom-up; gender and age; SDG6
Subject
Engineering, Automotive Engineering
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
