The report is complemented by an Executive Summary report, a "Spotlight" on case studies of urban resilience across Pacific landscapes, and a "Spotlight" detailing the exposure analysis from the report, all linked below.
Full report: Livable Pacific Cities and Towns: Urbanization Strategies for Resilience, Sustainability and Inclusion
Executive Summary: Livable Pacific Cities and Towns: Urbanization Strategies for Resilience, Sustainability and Inclusion
Spotlight: Tides of Change - Urban Resilience Across Pacific Landscapes
Spotlight: Mapping Risk, Building Resilience - Exposure Analysis of Pacific Urban Areas
Every year, more Pacific Islanders are moving to urban areas, drawn by the promise of better jobs, opportunity, and quality health and education services. In just 25 years, urban populations across Pacific Island Countries (PICs) are projected to double to 1.6 million people, compared to 2010 estimates, driven largely by migration from rural areas and outer islands to primary urban centers.
Figure 1: Urbanization populations are projected to increase steadily in the next three decades. Source: United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2018). World Urbanization Prospects: The 2018 Revision, Online Edition. Graphic by Yann Kerblat. An updated World Urbanization Prospects 2025 (WUP 2025) was published in November 2025, adopting a new harmonized geospatial methodology that re-defines urban areas to include cities and towns using a global methodology rather than the national definitions of urban areas from the World Urbanization Prospects 2018 (WUP2018) report.
But even as Pacific cities and towns grow rapidly, the promise of a better life often remains out of reach. Unregulated expansion and increasing disaster risk is pushing households and infrastructure into harm’s way. In Honiara, for example, a 2017 study found that much of the city’s recent growth had occurred on steep slopes and low-lying areas highly prone to floods and landslides. In the Republic of the Marshall Islands, without any form of adaptation, 37% of the building stock in the capital city of Majuro will be at risk of permanent inundation from a 1 meter sea level rise.
These real impacts underscore a critical opportunity: the Pacific’s urban future is already here and urgent action is needed to address growing risk while boosting economic opportunities.
Small scale, fast growth
Urbanization patterns in the Pacific are unique. Cities are small, geographically isolated, highly dispersed, and face increasing risk. The World Bank’s assessment of 38 Pacific urban and peri-urban areas indicates that exposure to natural hazards is rising sharply: by 2050, the number of people exposed to earthquakes and cyclones is expected to more than double, from 1 million to 2.4 million, while the exposure of building assets to pluvial and fluvial flooding is estimated at US$8.18 billion, an increase of 63% compared to 2024 estimates.
Land and governance systems make this challenge even more complex. With over 80% of land in most PICs under customary tenure, access to serviced and developable urban land is limited. As cities grow, urban expansion occurs increasingly through informal arrangements in peri-urban or hazard-prone areas, often outside municipal regulation. This has accelerated the growth of dense settlements on exposed land, where infrastructure is strained and of lower quality, meaning households face greater climate and disaster vulnerability.
Yet within these challenges lies enormous potential. Urban areas already account for 50-70% of regional GDP, concentrating innovation, investment, and employment.
Four Building Blocks of Livable Cities
The Livable Pacific Cities and Towns report identifies four building blocks to help Pacific governments and communities turn today’s challenges into tomorrow’s opportunities.
Figure 2: The four building blocks highlighted in the Livable Pacific Cities and Towns report offer recommendations for Pacific cities and towns to invest more in resilient urbanization. Source: World Bank.
1. Strengthen Risk-Informed Urban Management
Sound data and analysis should guide every urban planning decision. Governments can strengthen resilience by developing dedicated institutions; improving coordination across land, disaster, and urban planning frameworks; and steering growth away from high-risk areas through land-use policies and plans informed by multi-hazard risk assessments.
2. Enhance Preparedness to Shocks
Cities must be ready to act before disaster strikes. That means investing in emergency management systems, accessible evacuation routes, and early warning networks that reach everyone, especially those in informal settlements. Effective disaster preparedness means empowering urban communities to anticipate, adapt, and recover swiftly.
3. Invest in Resilient Infrastructure and Housing
Resilient infrastructure can save lives and livelihoods. Upgrading housing and buildings can create safer, stronger communities. Climate-smart designs that mitigate hazards such as earthquake shaking and strong winds can double as multi-purpose evacuation spaces, while partnerships with the private sector can pool financing opportunities, building on traditional knowledge that has long sustained Pacific societies.
4. Prioritize Social Inclusion and Communities
People are the foundation of resilient cities and towns. Urban resilience initiatives must prioritize women, youth, and the urban poor, ensuring that everyone benefits from urban development. Inclusive planning, where communities shape decisions, can build trust, ownership, and lasting impact.
Figure 3: Stakeholder consultations on urban resilience options with youth in Samoa during July 2024 helped the Government to better understand the needs of children and identify opportunities for enhanced livability in the township of Sālelologa. Source: World Bank
A Moment of Choice
The report outlines key next steps for Pacific cities to continue harnessing the opportunities for urban resilience:
1. Establish the area’s urban trajectory and growth profile based on the three growth trajectories and three growth types.
Figure 4: The report identifies three groups of Urban growth trajectories at the country level (top) and three urban growth types at the city level (bottom). These profiles can help policymakers and practitioners to potential urban planning and design strategies. Source: World Bank and ONE Architecture.
2. Conduct a multi-hazard risk assessment using city-level data inputs to better understand the risk profile of the city and potential vulnerable hotspots.
3. Conduct urban analysis and mapping of existing spatial and urban planning conditions, overlaid with multi-hazard risk mapping.
4. Identify potential investment and policy needs, informed by the risk assessment and urban analysis, in line with recommendations under the four building blocks.
5. Conduct a multi-criteria analysis to prioritize and phase urban resilience investment and policy reform opportunities.
Pacific cities are already demonstrating what’s possible — through risk-informed urban planning and resilient public spaces and buildings in RMI, resilient housing settlement infrastructure in Vanuatu, and managing growing urban pressures in South Tarawa by building resilience in the outer islands of Kiribati.
The choices made by cities today will shape how urban Pacific Islanders live and work for generations to come.
The Livable Pacific Cities and Towns report was made possible due to the generous financial support from the European Union, in the framework of the Africa Caribbean Pacific – European Union (Disaster Risk Management Programme, managed by the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR).