The opening stanza of the powerful poem from Naomi Woyengu—Director of the Hauskuk Initiative, at the 8th Session of the Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction—embodies the resilience of Pacific Women reclaiming the narrative of their leadership. Hauskuk Initiative is one of 13 partners of the Shifting the Power Coalition, actively working to reaffirm and lift diverse Pacific women’s leadership within local humanitarian mechanisms, weaving in traditional and scientific knowledge. Through the Pacific Owned Women-led Early Warning and Resilience (POWER) Systems programme, young women-led organisations like Hauskuk Initiative are working to strengthen community-based, women-led early warning and response systems that empower women, young women, and women with disabilities in rural Madang communities within Papua New Guinea to receive, understand, and act upon critical information regarding disasters and climate-related challenges. It is as Naomi says, “stirring something deeper than meals”: When the storms come,we do not wait for distant sirens.We are the sirens –the garamut beating in warning,the kundu calling us together.We are the plan.We are the first response. This collective work, supported by the Coalition, recognises the need for intersectional and intergenerational approaches in our ways of work. Vanessa Heleta, Executive Director of the Talitha Project in Tonga, emphasizes the importance of this perspective: “Young people have to understand the importance of documenting traditional knowledge, which is very important for them. However, they also want to see the voices of youth and young women, especially, being heard at the decision-making level,” says Vanessa Heleta, Executive Director of the TalithaProject in Tonga. Since 2016, the Shifting the Power Coalition has consistently worked to lift women’s leadership, including that of young women and women with disabilities, in disaster preparedness, response, and humanitarian action. Collective organising has taught us that women’s organisations, disability rights organisations, and feminist coalitions have the solutions to address the under-representation of Pacific Island women in local, traditional, and national governance spaces, and are partners in disaster management and climate change agenda to drive inclusive, community-led approaches. Our traditional settings mean that Pacific women have the knowledge and the foresight to address the intersecting challenges of climate change, disasters, and health emergencies. We are in a unique position to understand what response and preparedness should look like because we’ve been responsible for managing our homes and communities,” adds Vilimaina Naqelevuki, the Coalition’s Learning Coordinator. And as Carol Angir, the Deputy Head of Programmes and Humanitarian Lead at ActionAid Australia, shared: “It is time for the woman on the front line, time to come and sit and hear and let her narrative be told by herself so that the world can hear their stories.” To learn more, scan