This file photo shows Tepuka Islet on Funafuti Atoll. The tiny Pacific nation of Tuvalu has declared a state of emergency due to severe water shortages, prompting New Zealand to airlift in fresh supplies, according to officials in Wellington. Torsten Blackwood / AFP Photo

By Neil Sands
4 October 2011 (AFP) – A second South Pacific community has declared a state of emergency in a drought crisis that has seen water rationing imposed in parts of the region, officials in Wellington said Tuesday. Tokelau, a New Zealand-administered territory of about 1,400 people, has less than a week’s drinking water after a long drought blamed on a La Niña weather pattern, Foreign Minister Murray McCully said. McCully said Tokelau declared a state of emergency late Monday, following a similar move in neighbouring Tuvalu, which has a population of fewer than 11,000 and where water is already being rationed in places. […] McCully said other islands in the South Pacific were also reporting water shortages and New Zealand was rushing to assess the situation throughout the region amid fears the crisis could escalate. New Zealand was “making sure we deal with the drinking water issue most urgently,” he said. He said the situation was urgent in parts of Tuvalu. “There’s less than a week’s supply of drinking water on Funafuti, that’s the main island in Tuvalu,” he said. “I understand one of the other outlying islands, Nukulaelae, has a more urgent shortage and there is a desalination plant on the way there. “There are going to be some flow-on effects here, clearly this is having a severe impact on crops, so there’s likely to be a food shortage as well.” McCully said New Zealand, a major aid donor in the Pacific, “may yet be called upon to help in some other places”. He did not specify where. A Red Cross situation report on Tuvalu released last week said the former British colony relied mostly on rainwater, which has been scarce this year because of the La Niña weather pattern. La Niña causes extreme weather, including both drought and floods, and was blamed for deluges and floods in Australia, Southeast Asia, and South America over late 2010 and early 2011. David Hebblethwaite, a water conservation expert with the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC), said Tuvalu had experienced low rainfall for the past three years and there had been no precipitation at all for seven months. […]

Second Pacific island declares drought emergency