United Nations Radio

shrinking small island

Duration: 6'11"

SFX - FOGHORN

NARRATOR: Ribita Iubete is fishing for dinner. His canoe floats in the Pacific Ocean, just offshore from his home, Adoray, one of thirty three atoll islands that make up the nation of Kiribati.

IUBETE: (translation) He loves catching fish. It's like a game, he says. And the sea provides food for his family. For 4,000 years the seas have supported human life here, but many residents living here now have declared war against the ocean. Like Ribita's father, Iubete.

SFX

NARRATOR: On the beach, Iubete builds his sea wall, a barrier maded of wood and stones, in a bid to save his home from the rising sea.

IUBETE: I don't know why the waves are getting higher. All that I know is that I can see that they are getting higher and my trees are dying.

NARRATOR: As green house gasses warm the planet, water expands, tides rise and waves grow stronger. (sound of ocean) A recent report by the University of Colorado projects that sea levels will rise as much as two meters by the end of the century. That's enough to put Kiribati completely under water. It's a grim reality that the entire population of Kiribati must face, even its president, Anoti Tang:

TANG: What happens to our cultural identity? Where do we go?

NARRATOR: He's been raising the alarm internationally, warning that his nation is disappearing.

TANG: Already we have whole villages being washed out. There's no running away from the reality that the sea is rising. We are faced with a dilemma because nobody ever wants to leave the homeland, and nobody wants to lose their culture, their identity. The world community has never made any commitment, and this is the point of every speech that I make. You know, we are talking about the carbon trading, we're talking about everything else but dealing with the people that will be affected. Even the polar bears are being considered, but not the people that will be affected. There needs to be this refocus of attention by the world community.

NARRATOR: While the president hopes for answers from the global community, the people of Kiribati still need to survive. The nation has one of the lowest per annum capita GDP in the world and food security is just as much at risk as the country itself

Sfx sounds of forest

NARRATOR: Ribita brings his catch of the day home. He lays out the fish and sorts them into piles, but he says the size of his catch has been decreasing, just like the coconuts.

RIBITA: Before our coconuts were very big, but now they are as small as our fist. It's our main food and income and we can't get any so it's a big problem for our family and it's really affecting our lives.

NARRATOR: To avoid a situation where the already poor become poorer, President Tang wants to give these issues immediate attention so that at least in the short term the nation can sustain itself.

TANG: For the next 30 or 40 years we still have to continue with our development, we still have to deal with our daily problems, our yearly problem. And so that must carry on, there's no doubt about it. The opportunities, there are challenges, there are people with more time to do it. We just need tobe able to provide them with the opportunity, the skill and whatever equipment they need.

Sfx (sound of airplane engine)

NARRATOR: A team of specialists from IFAD, a UN agricultural development agency come to Araray from Ribita's island. It's the most Southern and remote of the islands, rarely visited by development organizations. Yet it has potential to become a center of food production, growing crops that could help feed populations on other islands, where the impact of climate change is advancing more quickly. Ron Hartzman from the IFAD team explains:

HARTZMAN: Agricultural research for instance could contribute to increasing soil fertility. Agricultural research could also contribute to developing crop varieties that they can grow in these areas that may increase productivity so they move from subsistence to having just a little bit of surplus that they can sell for income generation. So food security is a critical issue here.

Sfx (sounds of walking through the forest)

BEQUINES: If you look around here, you can see the different varieties of sweet potato that we are growing.

NARRATOR: Tokim Takay Bequines works at the Center of Excellence for Atoll Agriculture Research and Development, a research facility supported by the IFAD team and other partners.

BEQUINES: This is what we really needed to combat climate change impact.

NARRATOR: The aim is to identify food crop varieties able to tolerate rising temperatures and grow in salty water.

HARTZMAN: The battle against climate change is not lost and small Pacific remote islands such as this one may in fact hold valuable lessons that have global importance as the whole world tries to deal with the changes to our planet.

Sfx (sound of ocean waves)

NARRATOR: Investing in a country that's about to disappear may not be on the top of everyone's agenda, but there are lessons to be learned even if for Kiribati it may already be too late.

TANG: We will be victims regardless of what happens. If nothing is done then other countries and other peoples will be next on the front line. And when do we start? We sacrifice our standards of living for the sake of the future of this planet. This represents the single biggest challenge to humankind. And if it doesn't respond to this, then there isn't any credibility to anything.

NARRATOR: This is Sanne Winderickx from IFAD for UN Radio.

Duration: 6'15"