The Marshall Islands says it's ready to work with Covid-19 free countries in the Pacific to create economic opportunities amid the pandemic.
Fishermen at work in the hold of a purse seiner in the Marshall Islands. Photo: Francisco Blaha
Its Ambassador to Fiji Albon Ishoda said despite having no cases of the coronavirus, the country had been heavily impacted.
Ishoda said with its border closed, the country's main source of revenue, fisheries, had been hit hard.
He said the government wanted to discuss access to healthcare, support for infrastructure and adapting to climate change in the region.
He said the Marshall Islands was also looking to its Micronesian partners to create corridors to breed economic opportunities.
"Hopefully signalling to the larger Pacific countries that if we're Covid free and you are, what is stopping us from developing opportunities to better cope or to help us respond better economically to the current global recession."
Ishoda said the Marshall Islands had also been faced with other health threats prior to the pandemic.
He said last year, the Marshalls closed its border because it faced multiple outbreaks from dengue and measles in the Pacific.
"And now with Covid-19, our systems are not equipped to handle the pandemic as we have seen in other countries.
"For many of our people, we have a huge diaspora in the United States that have been affected tremendously by Covid-19."
Albon Ishoda is the Marshall Islands ambassador to Fiji. Photo: Supplied/Marshall Islands Embassy, Suva
Ambassador Ishoda said the government was working with other stakeholders to bring Marshallese stranded in the US home.
He said many of his people understood that by not returning home from the US sooner, they were helping keep the virus away from the Marshall Islands.
"For public health, this so Marshallese culture that they'll sacrifice a little bit more until a cure is found so they can safely return home without bringing the virus back to our shores."
Ishoda said he was also concerned at the impacts of climate change amid the pandemic.
He said one area that needed attention was the climate displacement issue.
"We're seeing parts of it play out right now - the access to healthcare, the rights to receive healthcare needed to beat the these types of pandemics.
"Covid-19 is a litmus test to ourselves, to our infrastructures and our ability to cope with the larger and bigger problem of climate change."
Ishoda said the Marshall Islands would like to see more action from other countries.
"As a small island country, we tend to become the first to feel these real impacts from these events that are created outside of our region and end up being the first to impact us such as Covid-19 and climate change."
The first group of Marshallese to be repatriated through the US Army base on Kwajalein Atoll in May were followed by 77 base workers since June 9. Photo: Hilary Hosia