Posted on December 29, 2025
Bateteba Aselu remembers Tuvalu as the “safest place in the world,” where inhabitants cared for one another, homelessness did not exist, and police sirens were a rare occurrence.
However, residents like Aselu are now threatened by rising sea levels and extreme weather in a country that lies about halfway between Australia and Hawai’i and where none of its land rises more than 20 feet above sea level.
As a result, she and others from Tuvalu are fleeing to Australia.
The country, with a population of 11,000 people, is made up of nine palm-fringed reef islands and coral atolls. Two of the coral atolls have already been almost totally swallowed up by water, as climate change melts glaciers and warms oceans, leading to rising sea levels, Euronews explained.
With an average elevation of about 7 feet, Tuvalu experienced a sea-level rise of 6 inches in the past 30 years, one-and-a-half times the global average, Reuters noted. NASA scientists predict that daily tides will submerge the main atoll and capital of Funafuti, home to 60 percent of Tuvalu’s population, by 2050. The entire country could become uninhabitable within the next 80 years, France 24 added.
A situation shared by many other Pacific nations, citizens of these countries often have no other choice but to leave, even if they would rather stay.
“In Tuvalu, the bond between people, land, and culture is unbreakable. For its people, home is not just where they live – it is who they are,” Kamal Amakrane, managing director of the UN’s Global Centre for Climate Mobility (GCCM), told Euronews. “Leaving is not what they want. Yet climate change is rewriting the future.”
As a result, Australia this year introduced a visa lottery for residents of Tuvalu as a part of the Falepili Union Treaty. More than 80 percent of the population applied for the scheme, considered the first of its kind in the world.
The scheme allows for 280 adult Tuvaluans to get visas granting permanent residency in Australia, along with access to subsidized education, medical insurance, disability insurance, family tax benefits, childcare subsidies, and youth allowances.
Unlike other existing Pacific visas schemes, this one is not tied to a job offer, and people can work, study, and live freely in Australia upon arrival.
The cap of 280 was chosen to balance Tuvalu’s need for a secure evacuation with the risks of rapid depopulation, India’s World wrote. However, the number can be adjusted if demand increases. At the current rate, it would take between 30 and 40 years for the entire population to relocate.
Tuvalu and Australia signed the Falepili Union Treaty in 2023, an agreement covering climate cooperation, dignified mobility, and shared security. Part of Canberra’s efforts to curb China’s expanding influence in the region, the treaty recognizes climate change as Tuvalu’s greatest threat, acknowledges Tuvaluans’ deep ancestral ties to land and sea, and commits to preserving Tuvalu’s statehood and sovereignty even if its land becomes uninhabitable, Deutsche Welle reported.
The treaty mandates that Australia will defend Tuvalu in the event of natural disasters, health pandemics, or “military aggression,” the Times of India added. It also gained a right of veto over Tuvalu’s security arrangements, sparking criticism that the island-nation was giving up part of its sovereignty.
Meanwhile, analysts point out that Tuvalu’s visa scheme was announced just as the International Court of Justice ruled in July that countries are legally obligated to prevent the harms of climate change, even beyond their own borders. The case also paves the way for citizens and countries hit by climate disasters to sue emitting countries for reparations while holding governments accountable for failing to safeguard human rights and a safe climate, the Conversation explained.
The Falepili Union recognizes that climate mobility is often a last resort, aiming both to enable Tuvaluans to move to Australia and to commit to climate cooperation in response to the country’s “existential threat posed by climate change,” the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace wrote.
“The rush for Australia’s new climate visa is emblematic of the existential threat faced by dozens of nations worldwide,” wrote Earth.org. “The growing threats of climate change are poised to reshape the world map, permanently altering borders, cultures, and geopolitics. Unless the world acts now, the disappearance of Tuvalu will serve as a prelude to large-scale loss and suffering around the world.”
Tuvaluans who have already moved to Australia say they miss their homeland but also remember the floods and say they feel relieved to have left.
Still, transitioning to life in Australia isn’t easy, says Aselu.
“It is a lot to take in and a process that requires time … having the social network from families, colleagues from school, and supervisors as well as spiritual space are crucial for us,” she told the Guardian. “Still, we (Tuvaluans) are collective and communal, and we adapt as we go through this life. (Our culture) will persist no matter where we land…”
