Pacific Islanders Are Losing Their Homes to Climate Change — and They Know Who's to Blame

In the small village of Yavusania on the west coast of Fiji, a mother named Lessy Rokocoko points to a muddy river and recalls four nearby homes that were swept away by flooding. She worries every day that the same thing could happen to her own house. Lessy, 31, is raising two young children in a place where floods keep getting worse. Her story is shared by millions of people across 14 Pacific Island nations who are on the front lines of the global climate crisis.

Lessy's village looks peaceful at first glance, with tall mango and coconut trees swaying in the ocean breeze. But the calm can be misleading, because floods regularly strike the low-lying coastal areas where about 90 percent of Fiji's people live. Lessy watches her two-year-old daughter, Joanna, play in the bushes nearby and wonders what kind of future the little girl will have. 'I don't want her to see or experience what we experienced when we were growing up,' Lessy says.

The Pacific Islands face some of the worst effects of climate change, even though they cause almost none of it. All 14 Pacific Island nations together produce only about 0.02 to 0.03 percent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions. By contrast, the United States produces 11 to 13 percent of global emissions and China produces about one third. Rising seas, powerful storms, and warming oceans are threatening to wipe out coastal communities and destroy the fish that islanders need for food.

Island leaders and activists are calling on the world to act before it is too late. They want high-polluting countries to make big cuts in emissions ahead of a major climate meeting called COP31, which is being held in November in Antalya, Turkey. The United Nations has warned that the world could warm by as much as 2.8 degrees Celsius by the end of this century. Scientists say warming must be kept below 1.5 degrees Celsius to avoid the worst permanent damage to Earth.

A taxi driver named Asaeli Moce, 52, sums up the anger felt by many islanders. He explains that his cousin's home is often cut off by floodwaters, forcing the cousin to wade through deep water just to do everyday tasks. 'Those countries overseas cause it,' Asaeli says. 'We are victims of it. We put very little into the atmosphere, but we are the ones being affected. We are on the verge of losing our heritage.'

In the nearby Sabeto Valley, a village headman named Ben Qoro is urging his neighbors to move away from a riverbank that is slowly crumbling away. A home sits just two meters from the edge of a steep three-meter drop into the river below. Ben warns that a flood or landslide could strike without any notice, day or night. 'Once a slide comes, there is no warning,' he says.

Some island nations are already taking drastic steps to prepare for the worst. The small nation of Tuvalu created the world's first 'digital nation' four years ago, building an online 3D copy of its land, culture, and government. This way, even if rising seas swallow the actual islands, Tuvalu's identity and records could survive. The government set up online voting and digital ID cards so its people could function as a nation even without physical land.

Young activists are using a pre-COP31 conference to make their voices heard. Vishal Prasad, 30, is the director of Pacific Islands Students Fighting Climate Change. He stood on the shore of Wailoaloa Beach, where sand is being eaten away by erosion and flooding. 'If we lose the 1.5 degrees Celsius target, we are in for a very, very horrific next few decades,' he says. 'We need to hold that line.'

For Lessy, Ben, and millions of other Pacific Islanders, the gap between world leaders and the real dangers people face every day can feel enormous. Their homes, land, and cultures are all at risk. But as Lessy sits down to a warm bowl of traditional Fijian food in her home, she allows herself to hope that the powerful people in those conference rooms are finally listening. 'We are not just small islands, we are also people,' she says.