While the international spotlight on Cancun may not have shone as brightly as it did in Copenhagen a year ago, the problem of climate change is no less severe.
A few weeks ago a number of small island states, along with Australia and some great powers like the US and China, met on the island of Tarawa in Kiribati to try and highlight the plight of island states and build some momentum going into Cancun.
The host of the conference, President Anote Tong of Kiribati, is no stranger to the global stage.
A year ago, along with Tuvalu, President Tong made a huge impact confronting the Copenhagen conference with the realisation that significantly rising sea levels would mean the end of his country.
The Ambo Declaration, which came out of the Tarawa Conference, made an urgent call on the parties to Cancun to take concrete steps toward a timely conclusion of a legally binding international agreement on climate change.
The Gillard Labor Government believes a well-balanced outcome was achieved at Cancun. We are committed to helping our island neighbours and our $80 million fund for ‘fast start’ climate change adaptation programs is a great example of this.
The concern being talked about really hit home to me when I visited these countries two weeks ago and saw the reality of their vulnerability.
Both Kiribati and Tuvalu are made up of a series of coral atolls. These islands are formed by coral reefs peeking their heads above the water.
As ground wins out in the battle against ocean, life on the atolls feels tenuous. At the end of the day these islands are slivers of land in the immensity of the Pacific.
On the one hand these are isolated parts of the world. The night skies are clear and there is no smog or traffic which comes with a big city.
The feeling of vast remoteness is present in Kiribati and Tuvalu. And yet at the same time, with near 50,000 people living on South Tarawa, there is an overwhelming sensation of being cramped.
Roads are narrow, backyards non-existent. Small dwellings are bunched in tight.
South Tarawa is one of the most densely populated islands in the world and with no building having more than two stories you certainly feel that on the ground.
The presence of the ocean is pervasive. While those growing up in central Australia never witness the sea, in Kiribati and Tuvalu there is barely a place where it is not in view.
There are points – many of them – where the width of the country is the width of the road. Gary Ablett could kick a footy across Kiribati with ease.
Little wonder then, that in a world of tsunamis and increasing cyclones, going to bed in Kiribati with the thought of rising sea levels makes for a restless sleep.
In Tuvalu the lack of space manifests in a surprising way.
The runway on Funafuti occupies nearly half the island making it the single biggest piece of infrastructure by a country mile. With only two flights a week, to leave it sitting unused makes no sense.
Instead it has become Funafuti’s central park.
Bordering the runway is Parliament and Government House along with the most salubrious addresses in town.
Come 5pm at the end of a working day the runway springs into life. Soccer, volleyball and games of touch rugby abound. Couples take their dogs for a walk along the length of it. Others just sit and take in the best experience of landed space that Tuvalu can provide.
There are issues, which in our lives in Australia we take for granted, that on Kiribati and Tuvalu are a real struggle.
There is an ongoing battle against rubbish. Landfill requires land and they don’t have any.
The result is rubbish dumps on either end of Fongafale Island which seem to threaten with their encroachment. To be sure, the Tuvaluans have made some progress on this in recent months but the war is far from won.
In Kiribati the mounting rubbish threatens another staple of life - namely, the country’s water supply. With ground water under the Tarawa atoll, ensuring that the mounting rubbish and waste doesn’t contaminate the country’s lifeline is a matter of national urgency.
Through Australian aid much work is being done on climate change adaptation including securing water resources.
The most important conclusion we draw from the experiences of Kiribati and Tuvalu is one we already know: arresting human-caused climate change is the challenge of our age.
But to see Kiribati and Tuvalu with your own eyes provides stark clarity that this challenge simply has to be met and, no matter last week’s result in Cancun, the world needs to arrive at an internationally binding agreement on climate change.
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