‘Existential Threat’: Tuvalu’s Fight to Survive, Even If It Sinks

Rising sea levels threaten to completely submerge Tuvalu in the coming decades. Facing an unprecedented crisis, officials are not only trying to preserve a shrinking country but attempting to ensure the nation, as well as its culture and traditions, will still exist, even if its land doesn’t.

By 2050. It’s estimated that about half of the country will be underwater. By 2100, that number would be 95%. Tuvalu is extremely susceptible to rising seas due to its small size and low elevation, which is just about two meters above sea level on average.

Pasuna Tuaga, Tuvalu’s permanent secretary for foreign affairs told Reuters, “Tuvalu wishes to champion sea level rise to be treated as a standalone agenda, not crowded under the climate change discourse,” adding, “It is an existential threat to Tuvalu’s statehood and survival of its identity.”

Although it has just 10 square miles of land mass, Tuvalu also controls about 290,000 square miles of the Pacific. It’s through this patch of ocean — Tuvalu’s maritime boundaries — that officials are trying to maintain the country’s existence, even if the sea submerges each of its nine islands. In that case, Tuvalu would keep control of its maritime boundaries and lucrative fishing rights, regardless of the state of its land.

Officials see two potential paths to preserve ownership of its maritime boundaries: through the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea or a resolution from the United Nations, Reuters reported.

Last Wednesday, Tuvalu came closer to the latter, when Feleti Teo, prime minister of Tuvalu, formally requested support for the country’s campaign to permanently recognize its maritime boundaries at the UN’s General Assembly.

“A rising ocean brings higher tides, and with increasing storm intensity, our villages and fields are devastated throughout the year,” he said. “Infrastructure such as homes, roads and power lines are washed away. Higher land on which to rebuild does not exist. Our peoples will be unable to exist on the islands and shores they have called home for generations.”

Teo also said climate change threatens the culture and very way of life for Tuvaluans and other island nations. “The existential threat we face is not of our making. But it will remake us,” he said. 

Teo said he wants to help shape an “ambitious” UN declaration for 2026.

He proposed six goals for the declaration, including ensuring upholding the principle of statehood continuity, which ensures a country’s statehood, even if it undergoes government or territory changes; reaffirming Tuvalu’s maritime zones; a pathway for safe, orderly climate migration; programs to safeguard Tuvaluan culture and heritage; improved financing mechanisms for vulnerable countries; and lastly, to establish a “dedicated platform to share best practices, innovative solutions and necessary data and analysis to support informed risk disaster management decisions in affected countries.”

Tuvaluans are weighing an important question: whether to stay in their home country amid rising sea levels, or to move to a safer country. Maani Maani, 32, an IT worker and resident of Fongafale told Reuters, “Some will have to go and some will want to stay here.”

“It’s a very hard decision to make,” he added. “To leave a country, you leave the culture you were born with, and culture is everything – family, your sister, your brother. It is everything.”

“It’s a very difficult conversation, very emotional,” Grace Malie, a young mother and Tuvalu resident, said in an interview according to the Associated Press. “And it’s 50-50. Some of us wish to stay. Some of them, because they have families,” will probably head to Australia.

In response to the looming threat of the country’s destruction from climate change, Tuvalu signed the Falepili Union treaty with Australia in 2023, which addresses Tuvalu’s need for support amid rising sea levels. The treaty sees that Australia provides $11 million for coastal restoration projects. It also allows for 280 Tuvaluans to emigrate to Australia annually to escape the worst effects of the climate crisis, starting next year. 

However, Teo says there is more work to be done. 

“As a coalition for higher ambition, we will continue to work with all of you to advance stronger advocacy, to raise global awareness, and to ensure higher commitments in support for the affected countries and communities,” he said, adding, “The international community needs to act now; we cannot afford to wait any longer.”