Paradise on the front line of global warming By Christopher Johnson
MAJURO, Marshall Islands - Perhaps more than anywhere else on Earth, the
catastrophic fear of rising seas hits home when flying into Majuro atoll, a
narrow strip of land in the middle of the vast Pacific Ocean.
Hovering above turquoise waters until the last moment, the plane lands on a
runway protected from crashing waves on both sides by nothing but a meter-high
wall. Driving the atoll's only road, the sea is always lurking on both sides,
with nothing to stop its
advance. Other than a few two- or three-story buildings, there is no high
ground at all in this idyllic atoll nation of 1,200 islands. None.
A natural disaster such as the recent tsunami in Samoa could wipe the entire
nation of 60,000 people, and 3,000 years of culture, off the surface of the
Earth. "Some people say, in 2012, the water will come," says Mentil Laik,
making a wave motion with his hand. "Majuro, all gone."
Yet he does not seem overly worried, because the Marshallese have a history of
surviving almost anything, including more than 60 US nuclear tests. Raised on
Ailuk Atoll, which suffered high radiation levels after the Castle Bravo
hydrogen bomb test in 1954, Laik, who was born at that time, has been showing
younger Marshallese how to carve and sail traditional canoes which for
centuries have carried islanders on epic voyages. In a worst-case scenario, he
says his largest craft could sail "all the way to America".
While delegates in Copenhagen debate the science of global warming [1],
Marshallese on the front lines of climate change see the impact of rising seas
on a daily basis. "The sea is too hot. The ice is melting. The water is rising.
The coral die, the fish die, the people die," Laik says in limited English.
Asked why, he points to the sky. "Ozone," he says. "Too many holes." The
solution, he says, is also simple. "Stop pollution. Everybody."
For many Marshallese, who have never spent a moment of their lives away from
the roaring ocean, evidence of climate change is everywhere. Laik says the
tide-line has been creeping up to the level of his boathouse in recent years.
Taxi drivers talk about ancient trees on their home islands falling into the
sea. Fishermen say they are catching fewer and smaller fish, while Japanese and
Chinese vessels keep most of the tuna for sale back home. Puddles of rain and
sea water dot the landscape, causing bacterial infections in locals who saunter
in flip-flops, unable to afford expensive imported shoes.
"Our land is very low, so we are very vulnerable to changes in the
environment," says Morean Kabua, a hospital employee. "The weather has become
very unpredictable. In the past few years, the rainy season has been going into
December and January. Now it can rain anytime in Majuro."
Last Christmas, a storm mixed with unusually high tides flooded Majuro, which
is teeming with shops and a faded old-time Pacific charm. The ocean poured
across the defenseless land from east to west, blowing holes in homes, sweeping
garbage into the lagoon, and scaring residents on smaller islets such as Ejit,
who dreaded being washed out to sea. Locals and aid workers also worry that
future storms could uproot Christian cemeteries perched dangerously beside the
raging Pacific.
"Graveyards are about to fall into the ocean," says Ingrid Ahlgren, a
Stanford-educated anthropologist who was born and raised on Kwajalein atoll.
"There's a potential that corpses can be exposed, and that's a health risk."
While Marshallese traditionally only built homes on the calmer lagoon side, and
buried their dead at sea, a population explosion on scarce land, plus the
influence of Christianity, led them to build homes and cemeteries on the
rougher ocean side. "What are you going to do with all these bodies," says
Ahlgren. "It's going to become a bigger problem over the next 50 years."
Many wonder who will take the initiative to deal with climate-related problems.
Given their nuclear history, Marshallese have long felt abused or neglected by
the outside world, which can only be reached by four- or five-hour flights to
Guam or Hawaii costing US$1,500 on Continental Airlines. Even with some of the
most pristine beaches, reefs, and surfing waves in the world, and quality
hotels including the Marshall Islands Resort, Hotel Robert Reimer's, and the
Long Island Hotel, the country receives only about 1,500 tourists a year -
about what a beach in Thailand would see in a single day.
"The industrialized nations of the world have to realize they have a
responsibility for the future, not just profits," says Bill Weza, a native of
Newfoundland in Canada who has managed more than 80 local staff at the upscale
Marshall Islands Resort for the past seven years. Like others, he says the
world should not underestimate the threat of rising seas to atoll nations such
as Kiribati and the Maldives. "If there's a big storm on top of a super high
tide, we're screwed."
Fortunately, the Marshalls have normally stayed outside the zone for typhoons
which devastate Fiji, Tonga and the Philippines further west. Many islanders
believe the coral reefs would shelter them from tsunamis. Yet some researchers
have estimated the Marshalls could become uninhabitable in 50 to 100 years -
within the lifetime of children playing in puddles today. "If that day comes,
it will be a disaster," Ahlgren says, because the country only has two
operational planes, and not enough boats to evacuate 60,000 people from
hundreds of distant islands.
She says that even if the entire populace relocated to the United States or
neighboring Micronesian islands with higher ground, the Marshallese government
would also have to think of how to manage the tuna fishing grounds, which
Japanese and Chinese already exploit by paying small fees to the government.
"They are faced with the entire destruction of their culture," says Ahlgren.
"Land is everything here. It's where all the power exists. People are so
connected to their land, they're reluctant to ever leave it. If you take away
the land, the culture disappears. People are so afraid of this, they don't even
want to broach the subject in public."
While the government has hosted conferences in Majuro at their hotel and
convention center, one non-governmental organization (NGO), Women United
Together for the Marshall Islands, has conducted four forums to reach people on
24 outer island groups, which can take days to reach by boat.
At first, many devout Christians wouldn't believe the warnings about global
warming, because "God promised Noah he wouldn't flood the world again," says
the group's director, Daisy Alik-Momotaro. "Many people believe that God will
save them, and they don't worry about it. They've been living on the same
island their whole life, and they never show fear, unlike the younger
generation who have gone to the US or read about these things. So we have to
convince these islanders that they have to save the world themselves."
To do this, NGO workers show them before-and-after photos of eroded coast lines
and fallen trees. "It makes them think for a long time. They don't understand
what makes the water rise, but they see it. Eventually they realize that God is
not happy, because we've been abusing the world. Maybe they will not do
anything about it yet. But now many people understand that global warming is a
big issue."
Note 1. The two-week United Nations summit on climate change underway in
Copenhagen, Denmark, is due to end with a meeting of world leaders on Friday.
Attended by more than 190 countries, the summit aims to seal national pledges
to curb the heat-trapping carbon gases that cause climate change, and set up a
mechanism to provide billions of dollars for poor countries facing worsening
drought, flood, and rising seas. However, as of Thursday, talks on a deal
remained deadlocked, due to a split between rich and poor countries over
cutting carbon emissions.
Tokyo-based journalist Christopher Johnson is author of Siamese
Dreams
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