Kreetika Kumar 
Minister for Rural and Maritime Development Sakiasi Ditoka has emphasised the vital role of traditional knowledge in disaster risk reduction and environmental management.
Ditoka highlighted the importance of preserving and relearning ancestral practices, especially in managing wetlands.
He notes that while conventional agriculture often aims to convert wetlands into arable land, these ecosystems exist for crucial reasons.
Minister for Rural and Maritime Development Sakiasi Ditoka.
Ditoka also stressed the ongoing efforts in Fiji to revive traditional knowledge for sustainable land use and involving chiefly infrastructures and rural and indigenous communities in disaster discussions.
“It’s just getting back to knowing what our elders used to do in those wetlands and relearning how to take advantage of what has been bequeathed to us in these environments. So that’s some of the things that we in the Pacific are doing, specifically in Fiji, just learning, relearning what used to be done in those kinds of wetlands.”
Ditoka also highlighted the integration of traditional knowledge into formal education.
He was speaking during the high-level session titled “Catalysing Governance Solutions for Disaster and Climate-Related Displacement” at the 8th Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction.
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