![]() ![]() The other half of the land was allocated to the construction of a football stadium.Īs a low-lying island in one of the world’s most vulnerable regions to extreme weather, Vanuatu remains vulnerable to natural disasters. In June 2016, for instance, the Council of Ministers declared the remaining half of an area called Freshwater Field as a ‘community space’, with the Ministry of Lands drafting a MOA with the Port Vila Municipal Council and the Freshwater Indigenous Council of Chiefs to ensure its proper management. While the reforms have encountered some difficulties – for example, it was reported it 2016 that the Land Ombudsman responsible for investigating complaints by customs owners or other indigenous citizens of irregularities or undue procedures surrounding land registrations – the reforms have provided a greater role for indigenous representatives over their lands. The new laws include recognition of customary institutions and establish an advisory role for the Malvatumauri (National Council of Chiefs) to influence parliamentary decisions on land law and increase communal control over land. Indigenous peoples’ land rights have long been an issue in Vanuatu since independence, with leases frequently signed off by authorities without the consent of communities – a problem that new legislation in 2014, amending the Constitution, has sought to address. There is some prospect of future mineral-extraction, including manganese deep-sea mining remains a controversial topic. Vanuatu’s status as a tax haven is also an important source of revenue despite external pressures for change. As most of its exports are agricultural Vanuatu’s income is susceptible to price fluctuations, exacerbated by high transport costs and the threat of cyclone damage due to its location in a disaster-prone region of the Pacific, meaning it continues to rely heavily on aid assistance. The majority of the population is engaged in subsistence agriculture and some fishing, but tourism has become significant. In both cases however there are no longer distinct communities. ![]() Like Wallisians and Futunans, they have experienced considerable difficulty in obtaining work permits and Vanuatu citizenship, despite having renounced Kiribati citizenship and having been in Vanuatu for several decades. From the early 1960s there was also migration of Gilbertese (i-Kiribati) and there were several hundred there in the 1980s. Since then the number has declined because of the difficulty of obtaining work permits. During the condominium years, Wallisians and Futunans migrated to Vanuatu to take up plantation employment and their population was around 1,000 at the time of independence. There are some recent migrant populations from other Pacific island states. Diversity is manifest in geographical, cultural and linguistic divisions. The Constitution declares the national language to be Bislama (a pidgin English), with the official languages also including English and French. ![]() Other smaller groups of indigenous peoples include Wallisians and Futunans and i-Kiribati, and there are also Chinese, European and Vietnamese minorities.įor its population size, it has a greater linguistic diversity than any other country in the world. The great majority of the population is Melanesian (known as ni-Vanuatu). Main religions: Christianity (various), animism Main languages: Melanesian (about 105 languages), Bislama, French, English ![]()
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