What is the future of remote island populations?
The needs and interests—indeed the very future of—remote populations in the region are often lost in economic development models promoted by urban center politicians, government managers, development planners and donor partners. While there is a lot of ink expended in reports concerning the need for ‘sustainable development’ or for the promotion of ‘self-reliance’ in Pacific islands, little attention gets paid to remote islands and villages. It’s a paradox of the Pacific that while development planners tout economic and other policies purportedly aimed at increasing self-reliance and sustainability, day-to-day policies tend to undermine life in the only location where people are, in fact, mostly self-reliant: the outer islands and remote villages.
As life gets more difficult in these remote island areas, increasingly people are voting with their feet by migrating to the urban centers, increasing pressure on already over-burdened government health, education and social services, or where they can, hopping on a plane to the United States, New Zealand or Australia.
The gap between government policy and goals for sustainable development and actual results needs to be a focus of discussions around the region.
The Marshall Islands may be an extreme example of this, but offers much food for thought. The 2011 national census report shows the population declined significantly on the outer islands, with all but three outer islands seeing a drop in numbers from the last census in 1999. Eighteen outer islands experienced population decreases, as people moved to Majuro, Ebeye or the United States. Today there are 4,000 fewer people on remote islands—about seven percent of the total population having left the outer islands between 1999 and 2011.
This migration has produced a major population shift. The census shows that almost three-quarters of all Marshallese in the Marshall Islands now live in Majuro and Ebeye. In the 1960s, more people lived on outer islands than in the two urban centers. Obviously, there is a continuing flow of people heading to the U.S. looking for jobs and educational opportunities, or medical care they cannot get in the Marshall Islands, and with the visa-free entry status that Marshallese, Micronesians and Palauans enjoy, moving to the U.S. is a relatively easy option.
The change in outer islands-urban population numbers carries an underlying message: as life gets more difficult on the remote islands, people move for better opportunities. The big picture question for leaders is: What is the overriding goal for the outer islands? Do we want people living there 20 years from now? If the answer is “yes,” then there are many development issues and needs that should be addressed. If the answer is “no,” then continuing on the path the country is one will quite likely produce the result of emptying the outer islands.
Ironically, the Compact of Free Association between the U.S. and the Marshall Islands, Federated States of Micronesia and Palau lists goals of “self-sufficiency” through economic development. The first Compact, which went into effect in 1986, affirms ‘the interest of the Government of the United States in promoting the economic advancement and self-sufficiency of the peoples of the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands.’ Compact II, which replaced the first Compact in 2004, states: ‘The Government of the United States reaffirms its continuing interest in promoting the economic advancement and budgetary self-reliance of the people of the Republic of the Marshall Islands.’
This is all well and good, but in light of the exodus from the outer islands, either something is wrong with implementation of development programs or it could simply be that now, with two generations of islanders born in the urban centers, the ties of government managers to the outer islands are becoming more and more tenuous. Many local officials may simply not realize the importance of improving the quality of life on the outer islands to the entire nation.
Outer islands ‘development’ needs are more than just the arrival of a cargo and passenger vessel every few months or occasional airline service, though these are critical to quality of life. The emphasis donors place on ‘developing the private sector’ and promoting ‘good governance’ generally translates into funding, focus, training and other efforts in the urban centers.
Still, the fact is, the only place in Marshall Islands and many countries in the region where “self-reliance” is apparent is on the outer islands or remote villages. Continued migration away from the outer islands—and lack of any big picture plan to increase their attractiveness and therefore maintain or increase the population base—is undermining goals and values national governments claim to endorse.
There are some exceptions to the rule. One is Namdrik Atoll, where an energetic team of Mayor Clarence Luther and Senator Mattlan Zackhras has produced a high degree of economic activity, including virgin coconut oil production and coconut tree replanting. This resulted in the atoll gaining United Nations Development Program recognition with the Equator Prize in 2012—Namdrik was one of only three islands in the Pacific to receive recognition from UNDP’s global sustainable development competition.
The local government at Utrik, an atoll in the north that suffers regular fresh water shortages for lack of rain, acted on the problem four years ago by installing solar and wind-powered reverse osmosis water making equipment that produces over 3,000 gallons of potable water daily. Locals were trained to operate and maintain the unit, and it remains a functional and integral part of the island. In contrast, national government programs for years have been focused on providing catchment tanks to other islands, which is useful when it’s raining. But a tank doesn’t help when there is no rain for months. Last year’s severe drought in the northern islands in the Marshalls prompted aid agencies to spend millions of dollars providing water, food, and small reverse osmosis units for emergency water service to over 15 outer islands. The provision of small, 300-to-400 gallon per day water makers was a stop-gap measure that provided some relief. Unlike the Utrik system, however, it was not sustainable because these small units depended on Majuro-based technicians to service them. It would seem logical that the government and its aid partners would look at the Utrik model as a way to sustainably manage drought conditions, and improving health and quality of life on other islands.
In the 1990s, the NGO Youth to Youth in Health engaged about 20 percent of the inhabited outer island communities in a holistic development program that included income generation activity, women’s business workshops, youth leadership, health assistant primary health trainings, school and community outreach health programs, clinic services, and sports activities. The income generating aspect of the program required attention to detail and working through many logistical hurdles that are a fact of life when dealing with services for remote islands. But over a three-to-four year period, the NGO-outer island collaboration demonstrated a number of successes. One of these was articulated by Ideto Jonathan, a health worker on one of the islands that partnered with Youth to Youth in Health. “Young people didn’t leave Ulien (Arno Atoll) because they were so busy working,” he said. “The girls were making handicrafts, the women were gardening. Youth to Youth in Health started a garden. Everyone was too busy. They didn’t want to go anywhere. They were happy where they were.” Speaking in an interview with me in 2012 for my recent book, Don’t Ever Whisper, Jonathan added, “now, everyone is migrating. Ulien young people are waiting for the next flight to the United States.”
Marshall Islands government officials will soon focus significant attention on the third international conference of Small Island States scheduled for Samoa later this year that is expected to craft the Pacific’s agenda for the global post-2015 sustainable development agenda. “For the Marshall Islands, the time is ripe for a renewed political commitment to sustainable development,” said a National Report issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs last May in preparation for this year’s meeting in Apia. “Looking beyond 2015, there needs to be a fundamental shift in development thinking that better links the global agenda with national development aspirations…we need to own our problems, and understand their root causes, in order to develop effective, culturally sensitive solutions to our development challenges.”
The question and the challenge for urban-based decision makers in these small island states is what priority do they place on rural communities and do they appreciate that self-reliance starts at the grassroots level—which in the Pacific islands means remote villages and outer islands.
