How is climate change affecting the Island Countries of the South Pacific?
What are they?
The Pacific Ocean is home of Pacific island which located in the east of the Philippines and Australia, and this region is also called Oceania. Oceania also covers the vast Australian Continent Island. Additionally, these islands are band together into three regions which include Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia (Wikipedia).
The world’s climate is rapidly changing, and this change brings drastic consequences to the world (–). South Pacific Islands are the victim of the changing dynamics of the global climate, and the existence of many islands are on the stake. Moreover, a large number of low-lying atolls will become part of the seas, and the world loses land. The prime reason for this emerging threat to the existence of the South Pacific Islands is that small islands are credible for only 0.03percent of the whole planet’s carbon dioxide emissions. Therefore, the Pacific Islanders are facing harsh consequences, which can take away their livelihoods, culture, and homeland. Researchers predicted that the situation of the South Pacific Islands depicts the submergence of many small islands as they soon become history due the carbon dioxide emissions.
However, there are other many potential threats could upsurge the negative aspects of climate change. Such threats could be the lack of freshwater and sea-level rise in some islands; even many islands are still battling with the reduced amount of freshwater. Consequently, the sea levels are continuously rising, which causes flooding. Along with that, the land of these islands is soaking water, and if the substantial amount of rain could not flush out the salt and other sea minerals than it will make it polluted. These aspects of climate change in the South Pacific Islands can steal the primary source of drinkable water and the islanders’ force to rely on shipments and rainfall water. Due to these causes, a group of Pacific island nations which includes Tong, Leste, Solomon Islands, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Fiji, and Kiribati- declared that they are suffering from the considerable climate crisis and urged to curtail these issues by taking some concrete steps. In a nutshell, they made the world aware of future disasters, which can slowly reduce the land from the landscape of the South Pacific Ocean. In a recent conference od United Nations (UN), ActionAid global climate change lead Harjeet Singh said: ” more places are becoming uninhabitable because of land degradation, rising sea levels or other weather impacts, and there is no choice but to relocate.”(–).
The above discussion shows that children of islanders can not see their homelands due to scarcity of the above resources and the rise of sea level. Therefore, it has observed that climate change is becoming a catalyst for the destruction of these islands, which will create displacement and scarcity of essential resources for the residents. I think there is dire need to convert these words into action, which will lead to a sustainable future for the planet.