Maldives seeks new land

The government of the Maldives — a chain of 1,200 islands and atolls located about 800 kilometres off India—is looking to buy a new country for its citizens before climate change leads to the nation being drowned by rising seas.

Most parts of the Maldives are only about 1.5 metres above sea level. The highest point in the country is only 2.4 metres above sea level. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is predicting that sea levels could rise by as much as 59 centimetres by 2100. The IPCC is a scientific intergovernmental body set up by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Programme.

Mohamed Nasheed, the country’s recently elected president, told The Guardian newspaper the government is planning for the worst.

“We can do nothing to stop climate change on our own and so we have to buy land elsewhere. It’s an insurance policy for the worst possible outcome,” said Nasheed, the country’s first democratically elected president.

Nasheed said Sri Lanka and India were early considerations because of their proximity and similar cultures, cuisines and climates. Australia is also apparently being considered.

“We do not want to leave the Maldives, but we also do not want to be climate refugees living in tents for decades,” Nasheed told The Guardian.

The Maldives relies primarily on tourism to support its 300,000 inhabitants.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 19th, 2010 at 11:42 am and is filed under On the Fringe. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site. Add to del.icio.us.