Feeling the Effects of Climate Change | Before the Flood

It's not about when the entire islands are underwater; it's well before that. It's going to be the crisis, and it's already happening. What we are facing at the moment is severe flooding. It's gone into the freshwater supply, and that's how people get their drinking water.

Have you spoken to people in the significant community that have given you some sort of a time frame? Given the scenarios and the projections put forward by the science, our islands will be underwater. So the question is, what do we do about it? At the moment, internally, we are relocating communities from certain parts of the island to where the water has not come up.

But our long-term strategy is something that I've been discussing internationally because we have to come to accept the reality that we may not be able to accommodate all of our people. We have adopted a policy of migration with dignity. We bought a piece of land in Fiji so that if our people choose to migrate, they can do it—they must do it as a matter of choice.

Well, I've got grandchildren. I've got 12 grandchildren. I'd like to be able to go away knowing that they will continue to have a future. Our islands in the Pacific are a paradise. We have sea level rise coming into the farmlands, coming into the homes. This is unbelievable!

When was this an intact island with homes on it? How long ago? 12 years ago. When you came, there were people living here. So within the 12-year period, this is the result. It's just a small picture of one place. The small island nations that contribute the least to the causes of climate change are actually going to feel the worst impacts, the worst scenarios because of global warming.