In Kiribati, sustainable land development and management are constrained by extreme physical vulnerability and the customary land tenure system. With overpopulation in South Tarawa and existential threats from sea-level rise, the country navigates a delicate balance between preserving traditional land rights and implementing climate-resilient spatial planning.

Kiribati’s land rights are deeply rooted in customary ownership, governed largely by the Native Lands Ordinance. The vast majority of land is privately owned by individuals or kinship groups, making land acquisition difficult. The State itself owns very little land; instead, it relies on long-term leases from traditional landowners for essential public infrastructure, administrative buildings, and urban settlement. Because kinship lands are passed down and subdivided across generations, one of the primary management challenges is the progressive fragmentation of plots into sizes too small to sustain housing or subsistence agriculture.