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After two years in office, the Labor Government under Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has improved the atmospherics of Australia’s engagement with the Pacific islands. At the end of eleven years of conservative government under former Prime Minister John Howard, relations with key Pacific governments were in tatters: the Moti affair and aid disputes had soured relations with Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands; Fiji’s interim administration was angry over post-coup ‘smart sanctions’ introduced by Australia and New Zealand; and John Howard’s refusal to act on global warming dismayed the small island states that are already suffering adverse climate impacts.

Developing nations in the Pacifi c are at the frontline of global climate change. Livelihoods and food and water sources that have sustained communities over generations are being threatened. People are losing land and being forced from their homes. Unless wealthy, developed countries like Australia and New Zealand take urgent action to curb emissions, some island nations in the Pacifi c face the very real threat of becoming uninhabitable.