Post #608873 by christiki295 on Mon, Oct 3, 2011 12:56 PM

As climate change is heating the atoll's shallow lagoon, the coral – the natural habitat of the reef fishes – is bleaching and dying. On top of this, sewage-water spills are increasingly causing algal blooms in the lagoon, killing the small reef fishes and thereby threatening the lives of larger fishes depending on them.

It is not only a problem of climate change, it's a huge problem of human pollution as well, says Tupalaga Poulasi, a research officer in the fisheries department.

The subsistence fishermen report that they have a harder time getting the daily fish for their families. According to interviews conducted by the fisheries department, the stories from the fishermen are mostly the same: they have to go further out in the lagoon than before (it is about 14km wide and 18km long), they have to fish longer to get the same amount of fish, and the fish they catch are smaller than they used to be.

Fish is not only a staple food; it is among the few traditional food items in which Tuvaluans are still self-sufficient.

But Funafuti is rapidly becoming urbanised, and overpopulated. About 5,000 people live there, half of the Tuvaluan population, on the meagre 1.4 square kilometres of land that surrounds the lagoon. Houses, buildings and associated infrastructure are replacing gardens, banana plants, papaya trees and other traditional crops such as pulaka, also known as swamp taro – a root vegetable grown in pits dug into the limestone atoll.

The remaining plants are exposed to rising seawater, salting the soils and ground water. Many have given up their garden production and depend on expensive, imported products: rice, flour, canned and tinned food.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/mar/04/tuvalu-sustainable-way-of-life-disappears