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The Inquiry: Will rising sea levels wipe countries off the map?

Will rising sea levels wipe countries off the map?

08/12/2022 GMT

BBC World Service - The Inquiry, Will rising sea levels wipe countries off the map?

By 2100, many small island nations will be underwater. But is their fate inevitable?

Rising seas caused by climate change will leave many small island nations underwater by 2100 – but are they fated to disappear?

Small island nations are facing an existential threat. It’s predicted that by 2100, Tuvalu, Kiribati, the Maldives and many others will be underwater, because of rising sea levels and increasingly extreme weather events. 

At the recent COP27 conference in Egypt. The most polluting industrialised countries agreed in principle to set up a “loss and damage” fund, effectively recognising that low-lying islands are bearing the brunt of climate change. 

But is their loss inevitable? Could traditional sea wall defences hold back the waters, or are there more effective solutions? Will entire communities need to be moved to higher ground, or even entire nations transplanted to safer locations? 

This week on the Inquiry, we’re asking: will rising sea levels wipe countries off the map?


Presented by Charmaine Cozier 
Produced by Ravi Naik 
Researcher Anoushka Mutanda-Dougherty 
Editor Tara McDermott 
Technical producer Richard Hannaford 
Broadcast Coordinator Brenda Brown


(a woman in a lagoon in the threatened coral atoll nation of Tuvalu. Credit: Mario Tama /Getty Images)

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