Kiribati: Climate Change and Migration - Relationships Between Household Vulnerability, Human Mobility and Climate Change

This report presents the results of the first nationally representative empirical study of relationships between household vulnerability, human mobility and climate change in the Pacific. Findings are based upon quantitative and qualitative fieldwork carried out in Kiribati during the early part of 2015 by researchers from the United Nations University Institute for Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS), the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) and the University of the South Pacific (USP). Project fieldwork involved implementation of a total of 377 household surveys in South Tarawa (72), North Tarawa (103), Marakei (75), Kiritimati (Christmas Island) (75) and Butaritari (52). Participatory Research Approach (PRA) tools and a Q study were used to complement the overall analysis. An Agent Based Model (ABM) was developed using the data generated from the fieldwork to simulate the future flows of migrants from Kiribati and migration patterns within Kiribati.