Kiribati is an island nation in the central Pacific, made up of 33 low-lying coral atolls and reef islands scattered across an immense expanse of ocean straddling the equator. Though its land area is tiny, its territorial waters are vast, and it is the only country in the world to lie in all four hemispheres, spanning the equator and the international date line. A remote and overwhelmingly rural nation of fishing and subsistence, Kiribati is among the countries most acutely threatened by rising seas, which endanger its very existence.

The islands were settled by Micronesian peoples thousands of years ago, with later contact and intermarriage with Polynesians and others. European whalers and traders arrived in the nineteenth century, and Britain established a protectorate over the Gilbert Islands, later joining them with the Ellice Islands as a single colony. During the Second World War the islands saw fierce fighting, including the bloody Battle of Tarawa. The Ellice Islands separated to become Tuvalu, and the Gilberts gained independence as Kiribati, a rendering of Gilberts in the local language, in 1979.

Gilbertese warriors armed with weapons edged with sharks' teeth, from the islands' traditional culture. Credit: Alfred Thomas Agate (Public domain).
Gilbertese warriors armed with weapons edged with sharks' teeth, from the islands' traditional culture. Credit: Alfred Thomas Agate (Public domain).

Kiribati consists of 33 atolls and reef islands grouped into three widely separated chains, the Gilbert, Phoenix, and Line Islands, spread across millions of square kilometres of the central Pacific, giving the small nation one of the largest exclusive economic zones in the world. The islands themselves are tiny, flat strips of coral barely a few metres above the sea, with no high ground anywhere, ringed by reefs and lagoons. This extreme low elevation makes Kiribati exceptionally vulnerable to rising sea levels, storm surges, and the contamination of its fresh water.

Flag of Kiribati.
Flag of Kiribati.

The flag of Kiribati has a red upper half bearing a golden frigatebird flying over a golden rising sun, and a lower half of blue and white wavy bands representing the Pacific Ocean. The rising sun reflects the country's position astride the equator, the frigatebird symbolises power, freedom, and the command of the sea, and the three white stripes among the waves stand for the three island groups of the nation. The design, derived from the colonial coat of arms, evokes the ocean world at the heart of I-Kiribati life.

Kiribati is an overwhelmingly Christian country, the result of missionary work in the nineteenth century, with the population divided mainly between the Roman Catholic Church and a Protestant church of Congregationalist origin, both of which are central to community and village life. Church membership and activity are an important part of I-Kiribati culture, and religious gatherings, song, and celebration feature strongly. Older beliefs and customs survive within the framework of a now deeply Christian society spread across the remote atolls.

The cuisine of Kiribati is shaped by the limited produce of the atolls and the bounty of the sea. Fish and other seafood, abundant in the surrounding waters, are the heart of the diet, eaten fresh or dried, along with the coconut in all its forms, the breadfruit, the pandanus fruit, and a giant swamp taro grown in pits. Coconut toddy, tapped from the palm, is a traditional drink. With little soil for farming, the people rely heavily on the ocean and the coconut, and imported rice has become a staple.

Agriculture is severely constrained on the thin, sandy soils of the coral atolls, and Kiribati grows little beyond coconuts, pandanus, breadfruit, and the laboriously cultivated giant swamp taro. Copra, dried coconut, is the main agricultural export. Far more important is the sea: fishing sustains daily life, and the licensing of foreign fleets to fish the country's enormous ocean territory for tuna is a vital source of national income. The islands of Banaba once held rich phosphate deposits, but these were exhausted under colonial mining.

The settlement of the atolls, the colonial era as the Gilbert Islands, and the ferocious Battle of Tarawa in 1943, one of the bloodiest of the Pacific war, shaped Kiribati's history, with independence following in 1979. The exhaustion of the phosphate of Banaba and the displacement of its people is a painful chapter. In modern times Kiribati has become a prominent voice in the world warning of climate change, its government even purchasing land abroad against the possibility that rising seas may one day make the islands uninhabitable.

American forces assault a Japanese position during the Battle of Tarawa in 1943, one of the bloodiest of the Pacific war. Credit: Unknown (Public domain).
American forces assault a Japanese position during the Battle of Tarawa in 1943, one of the bloodiest of the Pacific war. Credit: Unknown (Public domain).

Kiribati has a population of around 120,000 people, overwhelmingly the Micronesian I-Kiribati, with small minorities of other origins, sharing the Gilbertese language alongside English. The population is concentrated on the Gilbert Islands, especially the crowded capital atoll of South Tarawa, where a large share of the nation lives in increasingly dense conditions, while the more distant atolls remain sparsely settled. Life is largely traditional and communal, centred on the extended family and the village meeting house, in one of the most remote and low-lying nations on Earth.

A portrait of an islander of Kiribati, whose I-Kiribati people have lived on these atolls for thousands of years. Credit: Alfred Thomas Agate (Public domain).
A portrait of an islander of Kiribati, whose I-Kiribati people have lived on these atolls for thousands of years. Credit: Alfred Thomas Agate (Public domain).