Highlights
At least 18,000 houses have been damaged or destroyed by the cyclone.
Emergency Relief Coordinator allocates US $8 million to the response.
The estimated number of people in evacuation centres has decreased to fewer than 20,000.
Schooling for more than 72,000 primary and secondary school children has been disrupted.
Initial assessment results and reports of open defecation from communities show an urgent need for emergency sanitation.
Situation Overview
With situational and response information becoming more comprehensive, a number of key figures have been revised since the last Situation Report was issued. According to the latest data available from the National Disaster Management Office (NDMO), just under 20,000 people remain in evacuation centres – down from 55,400 on 4 March. The number of schools functioning as evacuation centres has been reduced to 45. There is a lack of information about the reasons and modalities of return, but the Government and partners are working to obtain a clearer view. IOM, in partnership with the Fiji Bureau of Statistics, has rolled out the Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM) and is expecting to receive preliminary data this week.
Shelter remains an immediate humanitarian priority as extremely strong cyclonic winds and multiple tsunami-like storm surges caused widespread damage and destruction to the country’s housing stock. The Government has finalised the damage assessment and there is ongoing work to aggregate the results. The current level of assessed housing damage indicates that at least 18,000 houses have been affected. However, this figure is likely to increase as the remaining forms are aggregated.