Climate Relocation in Fiji: Who Bears the Responsibility?

by: Isobel Anderson

For the residents of the island nation of Fiji, the climate crisis means more than a headline. Located 1,800 miles east of Australia with over three hundred islands and home to nearly 1 million people, the population’s access to secure housing, food sources, and clean water is increasingly threatened as rising sea levels and severe weather patterns reach a tipping point. Like other areas in the South-West Pacific, its ocean and surface temperatures have tripled compared to the global average rate. Severe cyclones regularly strike the area, with Cyclone Winston hitting Fiji in 2016, causing 44 fatalities and severe damage resulting in a loss of a third of the country’s GDP. The continual burning of fossil fuels only heats the planet’s surface further and traps more moisture in the atmosphere, creating the perfect storm for increasingly devastating tropical cyclones.

With the majority of its population occupying low-lying coastal communities, the threats of rising sea levels, intensifying storm surges, and coastal erosion have already forced a number of communities to relocate inland, making Fiji one of the first countries in the South Pacific to do so. The government has created a comprehensive plan – the Standard Operating Procedures for Planned Relocations – that outlines the most pressing issue resulting from the climate crisis: how to relocate communities whose homes are already, or will soon be, underwater. At this point, the question is no longer whether relocation is necessary, but rather, how to manage it effectively.

Fiji’s government does not have the capacity to fund the projects independently, with their GDP down 20% after the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the country’s main source of revenue, tourism, overnight. However, the need for funding is only increasing. As Sayed-Khaiyum, Fiji’s Minister for the Economy, laid out, “65%of the population of Fiji lives within 5 kilometers of the shoreline. That’s a lot of people… You’re going to have a lot more people living in the interior.”

Through innovative solutions to locate funding, the government imposed the world’s first relocation trust fund for people displaced by climate change. Though seed funding was sourced from taxes on hotels, restaurants, and civilian incomes, the Prime Minister stated at the 2019 UN general assembly that “this is not enough”, and that for Fiji’s relocation trust fund to be successful, it would require the support of international partners. While New Zealand made the first donation of $2 million to the fund in 2020, other global powers have not yet made the financial leap.

China, the United States, and India contributed 44.6% of global greenhouse gas emissions in 2021. While the onus of climate responsibility ought to fall upon these major powers, Fiji and other island nations have found themselves bearing the brunt of its disastrous consequences. With the world far off-track from its collectively established global warming limits, Fiji and other Pacific Island nations say that wealthier countries should pay for the inevitable ‘loss and damage’ they will, and already have, experienced to their countries’ infrastructure, communities, and well-being.

Money was a major talking point at the COP27 climate negotiations that took place in Egypt in November 2022. As world powers face their own economic turmoil, including inflation, potential recession, and energy shortages from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, strong commitments to climate compensation have become increasingly unlikely. While the climate summit established an agreement to create a ‘loss and damage’ fund last November, there was a notable lack of detail regarding where the money would come from or how the funds would be distributed.

A committee tasked with delineating the technicalities of the funding, made up of representatives from both developing and developed countries, held its first three-day meeting in March 2023 in Luxor, Egypt. While the talks did not cover contentious issues of finance sourcing and project details, delegates apparently made progress towards finding common ground on the fund’s implementation, said Mohamed Nasr, Egypt’s lead climate negotiator. This process, while representing progress, is far too slow, with ongoing negotiations lacking a clear decision-making mandate to protect the human lives and rights of South Pacific Island citizens. A lack of effective enforcement mechanisms, inconsistent international cooperation, and the prioritization of economic competitiveness has put countries on a frustrating cycle of grand promises with little concrete action.

The way forward in supporting countries who are on the frontlines of the climate crisis is uncertain, with endless political and economic considerations that have to be made. First and foremost, extensive international cooperation is required, alongside an urgency that has not yet been displayed by wealthy countries. The ‘loss and damage’ fund does represent a possible avenue through which global awareness and progress can be made to providing climate compensation for Fiji and other at-risk countries. Until that approach is implemented and countries are receiving financing, effective and realistic short-term solutions are required in the interim. Some support could be drawn from existing humanitarian aid networks. Many at-risk countries have already acquired significant debt after major climate disasters forced them to take on international loan payments to rebuild their communities. Countries could have their international loans forgiven if they were used in response to a climate crisis, allowing funds that would have been used in debt repayment to be reallocated to the development of locally based climate responses, such as the construction of seawalls for coastal defense.

“Many of these countries are burdened by debt,” says U.S. special climate envoy John Kerry. “They are greatly impacted by what happens with respect to the crisis,the climate. And then they turn around and the west or the north offers them more debt. That isn’t going to work.”

While communities can relocate and rebuild, much of what has been lost cannot be regained. In Fiji, communities who are forced to relocate have to make the impossible decision of either leaving behind the bones of loved ones, or exhuming them and taking them to their new home. Either choice is deeply traumatic. The deep connection between many Pacific Island communities and their traditional lands and seascapes has made relocation efforts especially complex. Culture, languages, and practices are often intertwined with the natural environment and its resources. Relocating communities to new locations can disrupt their traditions, knowledge, and practices, leading to a loss of cultural identity and heritage.

“Pacific people are still deeply spiritual… and deeply connected to the land,” said Netani Rika from the Pacific Conference of Churches (PCC). “It is the land God gave your forefathers and your forefathers have given to you, and now if you are moving away, it’s a sign almost that you are giving up on your responsibility.”

Any efforts to address climate-induced displacement must consider the importance of land connections. This may involve providing support for the preservation and restoration of cultural landscapes, traditional ecological knowledge, and supporting community-led decision-making processes.

Unfortunately, Fiji’s uncertain path forward is only the beginning. As temperatures continue to warm and sea levels continue to rise, forced climate migration will become the reality for coastal nations around the world. While the financing of relocation funds is a pressing and necessary issue, it is only a band-aid solution to climate change’s long-term consequences. If world leaders continue to fail in protecting our planet’s delicate ecosystem, more countries around the globe must face the disastrous consequences of climate change and will be forced to reckon with the role they played in its advancement.