Hi there, Ira here with Something Extra for you.

Last week on our Degrees of Change series, we talked about the ways indigenous communities are adapting to climate change where they live.

One of those communities is the Marshall Islands, an island nation that is on the front lines of sea level rise.

It's two dozen atolls rising only two

meters above the ocean already. Late last year, Science Friday producer Christy Taylor

had a chance to catch up with Hilda Hine, the past president of the Marshall Islands.

And in this interview, we're going to play for you today. Hiney spoke about how climate

change is already affecting the islands, how her country has already started to adapt, and why it's

so important that the Marshallese people be able to stay right where they are for as long as

possible. Take a listen. Until January, Dr. Hilda Hiney was the president

of the Marshall Islands. She was the first woman elected to the presidency there and the first

person from the Marshall Islands to earn a doctorate degree, a PhD in education. Hiney spent her

time in office advocating for her people and other Pacific island nations on the global stage.

The Marshall Islands are among the most vulnerable to sea level rise, consisting of more than two dozen coral atolls, mere feet above sea level, on a good day.

Already the islands have experienced catastrophic floods and, on the flip side, an increasing number of droughts.

Climate change is threatening infrastructure, agriculture, and their entire way of life.

Last October, President Heine addressed a packed auditorium at the Honolulu meeting of the Society

for the Advancement of Chicano's and Native Americans in Science, Sackness.

In her remarks, she touched on the legacy of the more than 60 U.S. nuclear weapons tests in the region,

including the bombing of Bikini Atoll, and the responsibility of bigger countries

with larger carbon footprints to help countries like hers adapt.

She talked about how forcing the Marshallese to leave their land and flee rising seas would destroy their identity as a culture.

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