Samoa in the Pacific

On the IMF's list of debt reviews, Samoa is rated moderate risk of debt distress. That was less than in Tonga, Kiribati and Tuvalu, but more than in Fiji, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea. ¹ The Lowy Institute ranks Samoa eighth in the Pacific for aid compared with the size of its economy, at 12% of GDP. ³ Samoa, Tonga and Vanuatu face the largest repayments to China; for Samoa and Vanuatu these are more than 1% of GDP. ⁴ Remittances were 22.4% of Samoa's GDP in 2025, second only to Tonga among these countries. ²

On the available 2023 measures, Samoa’s energy review put renewable electricity at 34.3%: below Fiji’s 52%, but above Vanuatu’s 23% and Tonga’s 15%. ¹²[web:2][web:21][web:10] The publishers use different national and regional data sources, so these figures are a guide to standing, not an exact league table. ¹²[web:2][web:21][web:10]

On the World Bank’s comparable 2024 measure, Samoa received more personal remittances relative to GDP than Fiji or Solomon Islands, but less than Tonga.¹[web:130] This is money received by an economy, not a measure of how evenly it reaches households.¹[web:130]

On the same ILO-modelled measure for 2025, Samoa’s unemployment rate was 5.0%, close to Fiji’s 5.3% and Vanuatu’s 5.1%, but above Tonga’s 2.0%. [web:17]¹ These are modelled figures, not new national labour force surveys: Samoa’s last survey measured unemployment in 2022. [web:17][web:1]¹² Overseas family money also matters across the region: the World Bank puts personal remittances at 22.4% of Samoa’s GDP and 39.3% of Tonga’s GDP in 2025. [web:18]³

On their own national basic-needs lines, the reported rates are 15.2% for Samoa’s 2023 survey, 20.6% for Tonga’s 2021 survey and 5.5% for Kiribati’s 2023–24 survey.¹²³ The lines and survey years differ, so these figures do not rank families against one shared Pacific poverty standard.¹²³ Fiji’s revised 2019–20 estimate is 24.1%, but its statistics bureau still displays 29.9% for that survey; the sources disagree on which figure to show.[web:27]⁴[web:30]

On the International Diabetes Federation measure published by the World Bank, Samoa’s estimated age-standardised diabetes prevalence among adults aged 20–79 was 25.4% in 2024, higher than each of the seven Pacific neighbours shown here.¹[web:51] These estimates are not results from new, identical national surveys in every country; Samoa’s estimate draws on its 2013 STEPS survey.¹[web:51][web:60]

In PILNA 2021, 48% of Samoa's Year 6 pupils met the reading level, below the regional average of 53%, above Tonga, Tuvalu and Kiribati, and below Solomon Islands and the Cook Islands. ¹² Vanuatu was at 50%. ³ In PILNA 2025, across the region, 44% of Year 4 pupils met the reading level and 72% the numeracy level; Samoa's own figure was not found. ⁴ On the World Bank's lower secondary completion rate, Samoa was at 96.8% in 2024, close to Tonga and Fiji and well above Vanuatu, Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea. ^5678910 That measure stops at lower secondary: Samoa's own Year 12 completion was 55% in 2024 and the 2025 household survey put secondary completion at 39%, so these numbers cannot be swapped. ¹¹¹²

On the World Bank’s 2025 government-effectiveness score, Samoa was below Fiji but above Tonga, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands.[web:1]¹ The score combines perceptions of public services and government performance; it does not measure a passport wait, a vacant post or the effect of one government’s decisions.[web:9]²

In the World Bank’s country data, remittances were 22.4% of Samoa’s GDP and 39.3% of Tonga’s in 2025. Fiji’s latest figure on those pages is 7.1% in 2024; Vanuatu’s is 17.2% in 2022, so the four rows are not all for the same year. ¹²³⁴[web:40][web:122][web:141][web:136] A separate World Bank Pacific report puts Samoa at 30.6% and Tonga at 37.4% for 2025. Those figures disagree with its country data; the sources checked do not reconcile the difference. ¹²⁵[web:40][web:122][web:34]

On press freedom Samoa now ranks below Fiji (24th) and Tonga (51st) but above Papua New Guinea (73rd), and RSF ranks only these four Pacific island countries. ¹²³⁴⁶ Talamua printed Papua New Guinea as 64th, but RSF's own page gives 73rd. ⁵⁴ On Freedom House's 2026 scores Samoa (84 of 100) is the highest of the six Pacific countries listed here, up from 81 in 2021. ^78910111216 In the only surveys that asked the same question, 53% of Samoans in 2020–21 were satisfied with how democracy worked, against 84% of ni-Vanuatu in 2023. ¹⁴¹³ In the 2026 youth survey, Samoan respondents were less likely than those in Solomon Islands or Fiji, but more likely than those in Tuvalu, to say leaders look after themselves or the rich. ¹⁵ In 2021, 49% of Samoans saw corruption in government as a big problem, below the ten-country average of 61%. Women hold 11.54% of seats in Samoa's 52-member Assembly. ¹⁷

RSF ranks only four Pacific Island countries on press freedom ¹. In 2026 Samoa ranked 59th of 180, down from 44th in 2025, behind Fiji at 24th and Tonga at 51st and ahead of Papua New Guinea at 73rd ²³⁴⁵⁶. PINA said the Prime Minister’s ban on the Samoa Observer was a major factor in Samoa’s fall ⁷. Freedom House’s 2026 scores put Samoa at 84 of 100, the highest of six Pacific countries checked, ahead of Vanuatu at 82, Tonga at 79, Solomon Islands at 74, Fiji at 72 and Papua New Guinea at 61 ^8910111213. Leaders in court are not only a Samoan story: Vanuatu’s former prime minister Charlot Salwai was given a suspended sentence for perjury in February 2021, and Tonga’s former prime minister Pohiva Tuʻiʻonetoa was found guilty of bribery in an election case in 2022 ¹⁴¹⁵. No regional data set counts criminal cases against sitting leaders or treason inquiries, so a fuller comparison is not possible.

RSF ranks only four Pacific Island countries; in 2026 Samoa, at 59th, was behind Fiji (24th) and Tonga (51st) and ahead of Papua New Guinea (73rd) ¹²³⁴⁵. Transparency International's 2025 corruption index scores Fiji 55, Vanuatu 47 and Solomon Islands 44 out of 100, but Samoa was not assessed in the 2024 index and no 2025 score for Samoa was found ⁶. CIVICUS rates Samoa's civic space open, at 81 of 100 ⁷.

International measures put Samoa among the Pacific countries less affected by crime, though the data are thin. The Global Organized Crime Index 2025 gives Samoa a criminality score of 2.38 out of 10, below Tonga (3.42) and Fiji (4.02) and close to Vanuatu (2.33) ¹²³⁴. A US government security report in October 2025 said Samoa's crime rates are relatively low compared with nearby Pacific nations ⁵. Samoa's last published prison count, 358 people in March 2019, was 179 per 100,000 people: above Vanuatu, Solomon Islands and the Cook Islands, below Tonga, Fiji and New Zealand ^6789101112. Those counts come from different years, from 2019 to 2026, so the comparison is rough. In 2017 Samoa's prisons held 121.2% of their official capacity, the highest occupancy among the neighbours listed ^6117108. The drug trade is regional: Australian police said in May 2026 that 17 tonnes of drugs, mostly cocaine, had been seized across the Pacific since January ¹³.

In Freedom House's 2026 reports, Samoa scores 3 out of 4 on freedom to practise a faith or none. Tonga, Fiji, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands each score 4 out of 4. On Pew's 2023 index of government restrictions, Samoa scores 1 out of 10, rated low. ¹ Fiji and Tuvalu score 2.6 (moderate) on the same index. ²³ Papua New Guinea's Parliament voted 80 to 4 in March 2025 to add a Christian declaration to its Constitution's preamble. ⁴ UN special rapporteurs wrote to Papua New Guinea about that law in October 2025. ⁵ Fiji's Constitution says religion and the state are separate. ⁶ Fiji's Council of Churches said on 30 June 2026 that Fiji should stay a secular state. ⁷ Tonga's Constitution requires Sunday to be kept holy, and most trade is barred that day. ⁸ Samoa places its Christian-nation clause in Article 1 of its Constitution, not only in the preamble. ⁹ The Pew and Freedom House scores were set before most of Samoa's 2026 measures had been assessed, so they do not yet show them.

In the World Bank's 2025 series, Samoa's 9.8% women in Parliament was second only to Kiribati (11.1%) among the eight Pacific countries in the table, and Tuvalu had none. ¹²³ With the sixth woman seated, Samoa reached about 11.5% in October 2026. ⁴ On the ILO's modelled estimates, Samoa's 2025 youth unemployment (13.0%) was second only to Fiji's (15.2%) among the six countries with figures. ⁵⁶ These model figures differ from Samoa's own survey, which found 13.4% in 2022 and 31.9% in 2017. ⁷ Samoa's 30.1% of young people not in work, education or training (2022) sits between Fiji's 20.8% (2024) and Kiribati's 35.4% (2023); survey years differ, so this is a rough guide. ⁸⁹¹⁰

Samoa's 2025 survey puts lifetime physical or sexual partner violence at 27% of partnered women, lower than the latest studies found in Fiji (64%), Solomon Islands (64%), Kiribati (68%) and Vanuatu (60%), and a little below the Cook Islands (33%). ¹²³⁴ Tonga's 2009 study reported 33% for physical partner violence alone, so it is not the same measure. ⁵ These comparisons are weak: the other countries' figures come from dedicated family-health studies done between 2009 and 2014, while Samoa's comes from a general health survey in 2025. ² Samoa's own 2017 Family Safety Study found 60% of women aged 20 to 49 had suffered some form of partner violence, which shows how much the method changes the number. ⁶ For the past year, Samoa's 19% in 2025 compares with 42% in Solomon Islands in 2009. ²