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© 2025 Island Innovation. All rights reserved.

    News

    Curated stories and analysis from islands and sustainability leaders worldwide.

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    Showing 9 of 391 news items in Culture & Community
    Building Media Resilience in African SIDS: Case studies from Comoros and São Tomé and Príncipe
    Culture & CommunityJanuary 25, 2026

    Building Media Resilience in African SIDS: Case studies from Comoros and São Tomé and Príncipe

    Excerpt from unesco.org In Comoros and São Tomé and Príncipe, two African island nations regularly exposed to extreme weather, media outlets are key actors in informing the public during emergencies and fostering a culture of prevention. With support from a UNESCO initiative carried out in partnership with the African Union of Broadcasting, Al-Watwan in Comoros and the national radio of São Tomé and Príncipe are taking concrete steps to institutionalise disaster preparedness, shifting from reactive reporting into proactive resilience-building.

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    For Ukrainians in Vardø, the Arctic is a refuge, not a battleground
    Culture & CommunityJanuary 16, 2026

    For Ukrainians in Vardø, the Arctic is a refuge, not a battleground

    Excerpt from cryopolitics.com The Arctic is often perceived as a future military theatre. But while war rages to the south, it has become a safe haven for refugees from Ukraine and beyond. To many, Norway is a resolutely northern country. Yet the country whose name means “the north way” in Old Norse is also an eastern country. Norway’s coastline, which looks like a child’s scribblings, stretches all the way around the top of the Scandinavian Peninsula to Russia, where, one could say, east meets east. Teetering on an island off the coastline’s very edge is its easternmost town, Vardø. Famously, it lies east of Istanbul and Saint Petersburg.

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    Why Greenland is indispensable to global climate science
    Culture & CommunityJanuary 15, 2026

    Why Greenland is indispensable to global climate science

    Excerpt from theconversation.com A 30-minute stroll across New York’s Central Park separates Trump Tower from the American Museum of Natural History. If the US president ever found himself inside the museum he could see the Cape York meteorite: a 58-tonne mass of iron taken from northwest Greenland and sold in 1897 by the explorer Robert Peary, with the help of local Inuit guides. For centuries before Danish colonisation, the people of Greenland had used fragments of the meteorite to make tools and hunting equipment. Peary removed that resource from local control, ultimately selling the meteorite for an amount equivalent to just US$1.5 million today. It was a transaction as one-sided as anything the president may now be contemplating.

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    Samoa faces double-edged labour mobility sword
    Culture & CommunityJanuary 7, 2026

    Samoa faces double-edged labour mobility sword

    Excerpt from islandsbusiness.com SAMOA faces a double-edged sword as labour mobility schemes flood the economy with remittances while draining local talent. Monthly remittances soar to $ST70 million (Samoan Tala), accounting for a staggering 35 per cent of GDP, yet the exodus of skilled workers threatens essential public services and local businesses. Amid rising wage disparities and emotional tolls on families, the government grapples with balancing economic benefits against the stark realities of community disruption. “The schemes began in 2007 with New Zealand seasonal work and expanded with Australian programs in 2012 and 2018, merging into PALM to cover multiple industries,” said Dr Masami Tsujita, an Associate Professor of Development Studies at the National University of Samoa.

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    An island depends on him to run the ferry. Who will do it after Terry?
    Culture & CommunityMay 20, 2026

    An island depends on him to run the ferry. Who will do it after Terry?

    Excerpt from washingtonpost.com Terry Laird, following in the footsteps of his father and uncle, has spent his adult life keeping the people who live on a tiny Chesapeake Bay island connected. It’s 6:15 in the morning when 50-year-old Terry Laird starts work for the day. The moon illuminates the path he drives from his house to his little red-and-white boat, The Captain Jason. Little Terry, as he’s known on the island, unspools a thick brown rope and sets the boat free. He hops in the front seat and jets off. Orange and blue start coloring the sky.

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    ‘We feel forgotten about’: How ferry disruption is impacting island life
    Culture & CommunityMay 7, 2026

    ‘We feel forgotten about’: How ferry disruption is impacting island life

    Excerpt from news.stv.tv Scotland’s islanders face weeks of disruption and delays as a beleaguered ferry service struggles to cope. Virtually every Scottish island has been cut off in recent weeks as state-owned operator CalMac warns of further disruption to the ageing ferry fleet. The delays, alongside planned maintenance of vessels, have seen ferries dominate the political agenda, becoming a major election issue as voters prepare to head to the polls in the Holyrood elections next month. On the Isle of Arran, one of the west coast’s best‑used ferry routes, the impact is being sharply felt.

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    Sri Lankan villagers adapt to threat of snakehead fish invasion
    Culture & CommunityDecember 8, 2025

    Sri Lankan villagers adapt to threat of snakehead fish invasion

    Excerpt from aljazeera.com An invasive fish is threatening livelihoods in a northwestern Sri Lankan village by devouring traditional fish and shellfish species in the Deduru Oya reservoir, but local fishers aim to transform this challenge into an opportunity. Over the past two years, fishermen have observed declining numbers of their typical catch while snakehead fish, previously unseen in Sri Lanka, have appeared in abundance. According to local officials, the snakehead fish, common in Thailand and Indonesia, likely arrived with imported ornamental fish. When they outgrew home aquariums, owners probably released them into the reservoir. Dr Kelum Wijenayake, a researcher studying the fish, explained that snakeheads have no natural predators in Sri Lanka’s ecosystem. “The Deduru Oya reservoir has provided them with an ideal breeding ground with ample food and no predator,” he said.

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    It’s time to raise soft boys and tough girls: Here’s how Iceland breaks down gender stereotypes
    Culture & CommunityNovember 27, 2025

    It’s time to raise soft boys and tough girls: Here’s how Iceland breaks down gender stereotypes

    Photo credit: Hiroshi Ichikawa/Alamy via monocle.com Excerpt from monocle.com If you had to name a nation that’s home to a network of schools practising strict gender segregation, your answer would probably not be Iceland. The country, which has been ranked first in the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Index for 16 consecutive years, currently has a female president, prime minister, head bishop and chief of police. But it is also the birthplace of the Hjalli model, an education system that is attempting to break down gender stereotypes among preschoolers by teaching girls to be more “masculine” and boys to be more “feminine”.

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    Curaçao to Cape Verde: Small nations make big World Cup history
    Culture & CommunityNovember 24, 2025

    Curaçao to Cape Verde: Small nations make big World Cup history

    Photo credit: Angel Batta/AFP via Getty images Excerpt from npr.org BOGOTA, Colombia — Few stories capture the magic of next year's FIFA World Cup quite like Curaçao—a small Caribbean nation that has defied history, geography, and every expectation to reach the biggest stage in global soccer. With 42 of the 48 spots to compete in the 2026 World Cup now filled, the tournament is already shaping up to be a historic one, with several other underdog nations defying the odds to play at the event jointly hosted by the United States, Mexico, and Canada next summer. While several major European, Africa and Asian soccer teams failed to qualify, including Nigeria, China, India, Greece, Serbia, and Hungary, multiple small nations have made global headlines by securing their place in next summer's competition, some for the first time.

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