Motivations for Students in the Republic of the Marshall Islands and the Federated States of Micronesia to Emigrate Abroad

2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (9) ◽  
pp. 1293-1296 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kanae Moriya ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Marshall Islands ◽  
Federated States Of Micronesia ◽  
Family Ties ◽  
Japanese Students ◽  
Japanese Student ◽  
Medical Facilities ◽  
Work Health ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Volcanic Islands

This study aims to find out the basis of Marshallese students’ aspirations to migrate abroad, determine whether intellectuals in the same country share such aspirations, observe how well Japanese university students and intellectuals understand why Marshallese students migrate, and compare the Marshallese students’ motivations to emigrate with those of students from the Federated States of Micronesia. I conducted a survey by interview and questionnaire in the Marshall Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, and Japan. I found that 65% of the students in the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) felt education was the primary reason to migrate abroad, followed by work (15%), health (8%), family (7%), climate change (3%), and natural disasters (2%). The RMI intellectuals correctly guessed the relative importance students granted the factors (education, work, health, etc.). However, they underestimated the importance of education for the students. Eleven percent of the Japanese students assumed that Marshallese students would wish to migrate abroad because of climate change, which overestimates the students’ feelings about the issue. Interestingly, no Japanese student considered health or family to be possible reasons for RMI students to emigrate abroad. Perhaps, Japanese students were not aware of the prevalence of very strong family ties and inadequate medical facilities in RMI. There were similar percentages of students who wished to migrate because of climate change between the RMI (3%) and the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) (4%). However, the RMI is an atoll country that may be submerged by climate change, and the FSM is mostly composed of volcanic islands that will not be submerged.

scholarly journals The Vulnerability of Health Infrastructure to the Impacts of Climate Change and Sea Level Rise in Small Island Countries in the South Pacific

2021 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
pp. 117863292110208
Author(s):  
Subhashni Taylor
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Sea Level Rise ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
South Pacific ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Marshall Islands ◽  
World Health ◽  
Small Island ◽  
Medical Facilities ◽  
Medical Infrastructure

Anthropogenic climate change and related sea level rise will have a range of impacts on populations, particularly in the low lying Pacific island countries (PICs). One of these impacts will be on the health and well-being of people in these nations. In such cases, access to medical facilities is important. This research looks at the medical facilities currently located on 14 PICs and how climate change related impacts such as sea level rise may affect these facilities. The medical infrastructure in each country were located using information from a range of sources such as Ministry of Health (MoH) websites, World Health Organization, Doctors Assisting in South Pacific Islands (DAISI), Commonwealth Health Online, and Google Maps. A spatial analysis was undertaken to identify medical infrastructure located within 4 zones from the coastline of each country: 0 to 50 m, 50 to 100 m, 100 to 200 m, and 200 to 500 m. The findings indicate that 62% of all assessed medical facilities in the 14 PICs are located within 500 m of the coast. The low-lying coral atoll countries of Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau, Tokelau, and Tuvalu will be highly affected as all medical facilities in these countries fall within 500 m of the coast. The results provide a baseline analysis of the threats posed by sea-level rise to existing critical medical infrastructure in the 14 PICs and could be useful for adaptive planning. These countries have limited financial and technical resources which will make adaptation challenging.

Memories and Expectations of Environmental Disaster: Some Lessons from the Marshall Islands

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Rudiak-Gould
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Marshall Islands ◽  
Environmental Disaster ◽  
The Public ◽  
History Of ◽  
Natural Protection ◽  
Human Habitation ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Public Imagination

The Republic of the Marshall Islands, an archipelago of low-lying coral atolls in eastern Micronesia, is one of four sovereign nations that may be rendered uninhabitable by climate change in the present century. It is not merely sea level rise which is expected to undermine life in these islands, but the synergy of multiple climatic threats (Barnett and Adger 2003). Rising oceans and increasingly frequent typhoons will exacerbate flooding at the same time that the islands’ natural protection—coral reefs—will die from warming waters and ocean acidification. Fresh water resources will be threatened by both droughts and salt contamination from flooding. Although the reaction of the coral atoll environment to climate change is uncertain, it is likely that the islands will no longer be able to support human habitation within fifty or a hundred years (Barnett and Adger 2003: 326)—quite possibly within the lifetimes of many Marshall Islanders living today. In the public imagination, climate change in vulnerable, remote locations is the intrusion of contamination into a formerly pristine environment, of danger into a once secure sanctuary, of change into a once static microcosm (see Lynas 2004: 81, 124). Archaeologists, of course, know better than this: every place has a history of environmental upheavals, and the Marshall Islands is no exception. Researchers agree that coral atolls are among the most precarious and marginal environments that humans have managed to inhabit (Weisler 1999; Yamaguchi et al. 2005: 27), existing only ‘on the margins of sustainability’ (Weisler 2001). The islands in fact only recently formed: while the reefs are tens of millions of years old, the islets that sit on them emerged from the sea only recently, probably around 2000 BP (Weisler et al. 2000: 194; Yamaguchi et al. 2005: 31–2), just before the first people arrived (Yamaguchi et al. 2005: 31–2). The new home that these early seafarers found was not so much an ancient safe haven as a fragile geological experiment—land whose very existence was tenuous long before humans were altering the global climate.

scholarly journals Influence of Religion, Culture and Education on Perception of Climate Change, and its Implications

2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (9) ◽  
pp. 1297-1302 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mikiyasu Nakayama ◽  
Irene Taafaki ◽  
Takuia Uakeia ◽  
Jennifer Seru ◽  
Yolanda McKay ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Sea Level Rise ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
Marshall Islands ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Taking Action ◽  
Surprising Finding ◽  
People’S Perceptions

This study aims to quantitatively find the influence of religion, culture and education on the perception of climate change, and its implications. A survey was carried out, with students of a college and a university in the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI), and a university in Kiribati answering a questionnaire. It emerged that education has more influence than religion or culture on people’s perceptions of climate change and its implications, both in the RMI and Kiribati. It is interesting because the two countries are not homogeneous in terms of history, culture and religion. Another surprising finding was that seemingly contradictory ideas (e.g., no flooding in the future as stated in the Bible, compared with the perceived sea level rise) exist in the minds of the majority of the respondents, both in RMI and Kiribati. Having conflicting ideas in one’s mind may delay one taking action to cope with climate change and its implications.

scholarly journals Influence of Religion, Culture and Education on Perception of Climate Change and its Implications: Applying Structural Equation Modeling (SEM)

2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (9) ◽  
pp. 1303-1308
Author(s):  
Daisuke Sasaki ◽  
Irene Taafaki ◽  
Takuia Uakeia ◽  
Jennifer Seru ◽  
Yolanda McKay ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Structural Equation Modeling ◽  
Structural Equation ◽  
Basic Structure ◽  
Marshall Islands ◽  
Equation Modeling ◽  
Path Coefficient ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Culture Education ◽  
International Collaborative Research

Currently, structural equation modeling (SEM) is widely used in the discipline of social sciences because of its capability in exploring causal relationships among variables. By applying SEM, this study aims to verify the hypothesis that there exist three fundamental factors (religion, culture, education) that influence the perception of climate change. The researchers took advantages of the output results of the questionnaire survey that had been conducted both in Majuro, the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) and in Tarawa, Republic of Kiribati, in an international collaborative research project titled “How Religion, Culture and Education Influence the Perception of People about Climate Change.” The results indicated that the two cases, namely RMI and Kiribati, were similar; that is the basic structure of both cases in the background of climate change bears some resemblance. Meanwhile, it should be noted that the path coefficient from education to the perception of climate change in the case of Kiribati (0.86) is much higher than that in the case of RMI (0.47). Thus, it is implied that education may significantly influence the perception of people about climate change and its implications, both in RMI and Kiribati. Based on this finding, it is advocated that further efforts should be devoted to education so that the perception of people about climate change and its implications can get much clearer.

Higher Education and Destination of the Youth in the Republic of the Marshall Islands: Implication for Climate-Induced Migration

2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (9) ◽  
pp. 1287-1292
Author(s):  
Nagisa Yoshioka ◽  
Irene Taafaki ◽  
Yolanda McKay ◽  
◽  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Higher Education ◽  
Marshall Islands ◽  
Tracking Data ◽  
Primary Reason ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Change Climate ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Migration Analysis ◽  
The University

Little is known about the extent to which climate change drives migration from the Pacific atoll nation of the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI). How and to what extent the youth of RMI aspire to migrate to other countries was investigated through a survey of 106 students at the Marshall Islands Campus of the University of the South Pacific (RMI-USP). While 44% of respondents indicated an aspiration to move abroad either for study or employment, and most students were well aware of the adverse effects of climate change, climate change was not cited as the primary reason or motivation for migration. Analysis of data in a second study explored the University’s tracking data of Foundation Year graduates from the RMI-USP Joint Education Program. This analysis found that students who have studied abroad are more likely to have the opportunity to either stay abroad or to migrate at some time after their studies.

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