The low-lying island nation of around 13,000 residents is planning a mass inland relocation as creeping seas start to eat away at its fertile coastal fringe.
It will drum up funding by selling passports to foreigners for US$105,000 each, despite fears such schemes are ripe for criminal exploitation.
“For Nauru it is not just about adapting to climate change, but about securing a sustainable and prosperous future for generations to come,” Adeang said.
“This is about more than survival. It is about ensuring future generations have a safe, resilient and sustainable home. We are ready for the journey ahead.”
The island republic sits on a small plateau of phosphate rock in the sparsely populated South Pacific.
With a total landmass of just 21 square kilometres (eight square miles), it is one of the world’s smallest nations.
Unusually pure phosphate deposits — a key ingredient in fertiliser — once made Nauru one of the wealthiest places, per capita, on the planet.
But these supplies have long dried up, and researchers today estimate 80 percent of Nauru has been rendered uninhabitable by mining.
What little land Nauru has left is threatened by encroaching tides — scientists have measured sea levels rising 1.5 times faster than global averages.
Existing climate funding efforts are “not sufficient” to address the challenge, said Edward Clark, who runs Nauru’s new Economic and Climate Resilience Citizenship Program.
“Debt financing places an undue burden on future generations and there is not enough aid,” he told AFP.
Nauru’s government expects to reap US$5.7 million in the programme’s first year, equating to around 66 successful applications, Clark said.
It hopes this will gradually increase to US$43 million -– or about 500 successful applications — which would account for almost 20 percent of total government revenue.
Nauru officials believe 90 percent of the population will eventually need to move to higher ground.
The first phase of this mass relocation is estimated to cost more than US$60 million.
To pay the bill, Nauru has pinned its hopes on the new citizenship-by-investment programme.
Clark said it was a kind of “innovation”.
“It is well known that developing climate-vulnerable countries are disproportionately impacted by climate change, and there is therefore an urgent need to ensure they disproportionately benefit from climate innovation,” he said.
Nations such as Nauru “have both a need and a right to be prosperous”, Clark added.
