Climate Change - Tuvalu

Global climate change may cause some small countries to disappear entirely.

While global climate change may seem far-off and nebulous to many Americans, people in other parts of the world are already experiencing the devastating effects of global warming. In fact, some nations, like Tuvalu, are actually shrinking and may eventually disappear. Tuvalu is a small island nation made up of nine tiny atolls near Fiji. In recent years alone, the country has already lost one meter of land around the circumference of their largest atoll, and there wasn't much to spare. At its widest point, Tuvalu only spans a couple hundred yards.

Tuvalu's shrinking size is just more evidence to scientists that global climate change is real. While ten or fifteen years ago, some scientists still debated whether or not climate change was happening, today the vast majority of scientists agree that temperatures are climbing, glaciers are melting and ocean levels are rising. And, California State University Professor, Dr. Rick Behl says that research indicates that more warming will occur in the next hundred years than has happened on this planet in the last 20,000 years. And Behl says, most scientists now agree that this severe degree of climate change is due to man-made phenomena -- namely high emissions of greenhouse gasses like carbon dioxide.

Until a few years ago, Tuvalu was suffering in complete obscurity. But in 1998, Pasadena-based Idealab bought Tuvalu's Internet domain address extension, which happened to be dot-tv (.tv), just like for the United States it is dot-us (.us) or Russia is dot-ru (.ru). Idealab's Chief Operating Officer, Craig Frances says that those two letters, tv, are known around the world and are synonymous with entertainment. Idealab now sells Internet domain registrations such as www.nbc.tv as an alternative to the traditional dot-com (.com) extension. In exchange for the dot-tv extension, Idealab agreed to pay Tuvalu's government $4 million US dollars per year for the next 20 years, effectively doubling their GDP.

With that money, Tuvalu joined the United Nations, in part to help draw attention to the effects of global climate change on their tiny nation. They have joined the Pacific Island Climate Change Assistance Program (PICCAP) and established a five-point plan to address the effects of global warming on their country. Tuvalu’s plan includes the selection of a climate change research committee, conducting a greenhouse gas inventory, communicating with the UN on climate change and rising sea levels, studying island vulnerability and adaptation strategies and then developing a national implementation strategy for climate change. Tuvalu has already completed the first four tasks and is hoping to have a plan in place by this June on how they can best combat and acclimate to the coming changes.

CONTACTS

Mr. Namoto Kelisiano: Tuvalu Minster of Natural Resources, Energy and Environment
Tuvalu
Phone: 011 (688) 20828

Mr. Mataio Tekinene: Tuvalu Environment Officer
Tuvalu Ministry of Natural Resources & Environment
Phone: 011 (688) 20179
Fax: 011 (688) 20826, 1 801 606 7458

Mr. Pasuna Tuaga: Tuvalu Foreign Affairs Officer

Mr. Koloa Talake: Special Advisor to the Prime Minister and the .tv Corporation Advisory Board Member

Craig Frances: Chief Operating Officer
.tv Corporation
Pasadena, California
Phone: (310) 481-3703
Fax: (310) 481-3888

Rick Behl: Paleo-oceanagrapher
California State University, Long Beach
1250 Bellflower Blvd., Long Beach, CA 90840

M. Osman Siddique: Ambassador to Fiji, Tonga, Nauru and Tuvalu
US Embassy
31 Loftus Street, Suva, Fiji
Phone: 011 (679) 314-466
Fax: 011 (679) 300-081

LINKS

Tuvalu's Prime Minister gave this address, which mentions global warming, when his country joined the United Nations.

Environmental writer Bill McKibben wrote this article about the science behind climate change in the April 30, 2001 issue of In These Times.

The United Nations has a framework convention on climate change.

The United Nations produced this report on the impacts of climate change on small islands.

The Pew Charitable Trusts established the Center on Global Climate Change.

The EPA produces this information site on global warming.

The EPA also provides this global warming glossary.

This article in Britannica.com discusses global warming in Tuvalu.

ACFnewsource provides links to sites maintained by other organizations for informational purposes only. ACFnewsource has no responsibility for the accuracy of the content of any Web site to which a link is provided. The groups included on the list do not necessarily reflect the views of ACFnewsource.

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