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The evolution and expansion of the human species over the past few hundred thousand years, an infinitesimal fraction of planetary time, now sees us as the dominant life form on Earth. We are dominant because of our intelligence and adaptability, and our need to constantly strive for newer and better ways of doing things. But there are now six billion of us, predicted to increase to 8-10 billion by 2050, and our domination of the planet is paralleled by the massive impact that we have had on the Earth's ecosystems. A recent mapping of the human footprint on the planet has concluded that more than 80% of the Earth's land surface is directly influenced by humans. We consume 40% of the Earth's net primary productivity, 35% of oceanic shelf productivity and 60% of freshwater runoff. As a result, remaining natural landscapes are rapidly being modified and the Earth's biological diversity continues to decline at an alarming rate. The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA) has found that in the last several decades 20% of the world’s coral reefs were lost and 20% degraded, while 35% of mangrove area has been lost. The MEA also concluded that humans have likely increased the species extinction rate by as much as 1,000 times over background rates typical throughout Earth's history.

The impacts of climate change on biodiversity and the degree to which autonomous and directed adaptation will lesson these impacts are likely to be complex and hard to predict. This will make the research information we gain particularly difficult to communicate to the people who will be required to act on this information, namely ecosystem managers, resource managers, the public and policy makers

The climate of Tonga is tropical. It lies within the southeast trade wind zone of the South Pacific. Climatic parameters include rainfall, temperture. wind and sunshine hours. Tonga's annual rainfall can be defined by two seasons, the wet and dry seasons. Wet season is also known as the cyclone season and it is noticeable from November to April. Dry season runs from May to October. The wettest months are particularly January. February and March that may exceed 250mm of rainfall per month. During dry season, the amount of rainfall received per month is less than 250mm.

Small island developing States (SIDS) have long been recognized by the international community as a special case whose needs and concerns have to be addressed. Although these countries are among the least responsible for climate change, they are likely to suffer most from its adverse effects and could in some cases even become uninhabitable. This is what makes them a special case requiring the help and attention of the international community.

These guidelines have been developed to assist CARICOM and SPREP country practitioners with the integration of climate change adaptation considerations into the environmental impact assessment (EIA) process, thereby ensuring the selection and implementation of feasible options for development projects. The guidelines adopt a risk management approach for dealing with the existent uncertainties associated with the present status of our knowledge to climate change.

Water resources on coral atolls are from ground water lenses. These lenses are extremely fragile and in many areas very limited in magnitude. Water lenses are also primary longterm water storage facility for many people. The quality of the lens is dependent on rainfall and the width of the land. From this, it is clearly evident that water resources in Kiribati would be threatened by climate change involving more frequent (shorter with severer impacts) or longer duration droughts and coastal erosion

Coral reefs represent some of the most biologically diverse ecosystems on Earth, providing critical habitat to approximately 25 percent of marine species. In addition, these ecosystems provide economic benefits through tourism and fisheries. One recent estimate valued the annual net economic benefits of the world’s coral reefs at $30 billion. However, human activities including development in coastal areas, over-fishing, and pollution have contributed to a global loss of over 10 percent of these valuable ecosystems. An additional 15 percent have been lost due to warming of the surface ocean, and climate change will further contribute to coral reef degradation in the decades ahead.

Plants, birds, insects, mammals, amphibians and fishes are rapidly responding to the observed changes in climate everywhere on the planet. Extreme high temperatures immediately result in hefty responses. The responses, however, significantly differ from species to species and from year to year, which complicates a clear attribution of causes. The ecological impacts are nowadays visible everywhere through changes in the timing of life cycle events and the geographic distributions of species. Plants have advanced flowering by up to 30 days and are now doing so at dates never documented in the last two centuries. Some species show a dramatic increase in range area, disrupting ecosystems like, for example, the rapid spread over millions of hectares of the Mountain Pine Beetle in North America and the northward expansion of the Oak Processionary caterpillar in The Netherlands. Also fires have increased catastrophically in tropical wet forests during the severe droughts of the El Niño years in the nineties. Other species show a dramatic decrease in distribution or population sizes, illustrated by bleaching corals and disappearing amphibians worldwide. Warm winters, hot summers, excessive precipitation and extended droughts are weather events that trigger these responses

"We don’t want to leave this place. We don’t want to leave, it’s our land, our God given land, it is our culture, we can’t leave. People won’t leave until the very last minute.” With these dramatic words, Paani Laupepa, the former assistant secretary at Tuvalu's Ministry of Natural Resources, Energy and Environment, expressed the feelings of many Tuvaluans when it comes to the worst-case scenario of climate change and its effects on small island nations. The scenarios and warnings of international scientist on climate change and its inevitable consequences must be like a constant Damocles Sword for the inhabitants of Tuvalu. For the 21st century, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) states that there will be a warming of global temperatures and a rise of the sea level by up to almost one meter.