As danger laps at its shores, Tuvalu pleads for action on climate change
By AMELIA HOLOWATY KRALES
18 October 2011 Tuvalu, a tiny archipelago of nine South Pacific islands threatened by rising seas, is on the front lines of the planet’s climate change debate. Current projections indicate that it will become unlivable within 50 years, resulting in an exodus and the erasure of a rich 3,000-year-old culture. In global climate forums, Tuvalu’s government has repeatedly hammered home the message that its 11,000 citizens have hardly contributed to the heat-trapping emissions that cause climate change yet are among the first to deal with the consequences. At the same time, the country is struggling this year with a drought and crippling freshwater shortage related to the La Niña weather pattern in the Pacific. (The scientific jury is still out on whether global warming will lead to more frequent La Niñas.) I lived in Tuvalu on a Fulbright grant from October 2010 until last August, photographing scenes of daily life, and in the process I came to understand the complex ways in which climate change is affecting people there. (In addition to the photos here, check out this slide show at the Lens blog.) Virtually everyone I met seemed to have an observation, story or worry to share, from a farmer whose root vegetable crop had withered to a business owner who sailed from the capital, Funafuti, to once-familiar islets recently. “I have been to the islets to get some coconuts from a piece of land there and three-quarters had been taken away by the sea,” the business owner, Taafaki Semu, said. Beyond such anecdotes, a recent report (PDF) from Tuvalu’s government adaptation project and the United Nations Development Program ticked off the following climate-change concerns.
- Extreme weather has become far more frequent and more intense in Tuvalu, with ocean surges from cyclones causing flash flooding that wipes away or severely damages homes, leaving people without shelter for long periods.
- The traditional diet in Tuvalu is based on fish, coconuts and starchy vegetables like breadfruit, pulaka and taro. Fisheries have been depleted in recent years by an increase in water temperatures; erosion has caused the loss of tracts of livable and arable land along the shore, devastating crops and livelihoods.
- The soil farther inland has suffered, too, with crop failures attributed to increases in flooding and higher salinity in the groundwater. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization has financed an effort to introduce salt-resistant banana plants to the islands, and another involving salt-resistant taro root is in the works.
- Most residents rely mostly on rainwater for drinking and bathing, with catchments on their dwellings funneling the water into storage tanks. During droughts, families can normally collect water from community cisterns or desalinated water that is available to buy from the Public Works Department. But rain this year and last has been so sparse that people are on the verge of running out altogether. (This month New Zealand and Australia shipped emergency desalination plants to Tuvalu to treat seawater, but strict rationing and a state of emergency continue.)
- People in Tuvalu whose homes are in areas prone to flooding and storm surges, are more vulnerable to water-borne diseases, flu, and respiratory ailments. […]
