French Polynesia

The low coral atolls of the Tuamotus have no rivers or lakes and depend entirely on rainwater catchment, leaving supply precarious.

Local production is largely subsistence taro, breadfruit, cassava and fish, supplemented by cash crops of vanilla, copra and noni.

The everyday diet is fish-forward and increasingly shaped by imported processed food, so plant-based eating is available and traditional rather than dominant.

Agriculture is mostly smallholder and subsistence with low-input methods but little formal certification, so the score reflects documented low-input rather than certified-organic farming.

such as the Fakarava UNESCO Biosphere alongside traditional rāhui closures. Most of that area is sustainable-use rather than strict no-take, however, and only 5.6% of land is protected.

episodes and are now the subject of active reintroductions. Marine life is iconic too, from humpback whales breeding inshore at Rurutu to Fakarava's famous aggregation of around 700 grey reef sharks.

ld a French Appellation d'Origine since 1992. These crafts remain part of ceremony and daily life.

There is no confirmed single-use-plastic ban and the outer archipelagos have little waste infrastructure, so plastic and litter pressure on lagoons is a real concern.

Fenua Ma provides six-stream sorting on Tahiti and Moorea, crushing glass locally and exporting plastic and e-waste, but coverage is thin across the outer archipelagos.

rowing solar share (about 7 per cent). Per person emissions are moderate at 3.27 tonnes of CO2 in 2024, held down by a small industrial base rather than by clean power. The territory has set a target of 75 per cent renewable electricity by 2030 and is investing in sea water air conditioning and island solar, though outer islands remain almost entirely diesel powered. Progress is real but partial, and the grid is still fossil dominated.

craft sales channelling income to households. The large over-water-bungalow resort sector nonetheless concentrates much of the tourism revenue.

Tahitian dance, the fast ʻōteʻa and the swaying hura, is practised across the islands and celebrated each July at the Heiva i Tahiti festival, alongside himene tārava choral singing whose layered harmonies are unique to the region. Ancestral Mā'ohi traditions endure through the revival of tatau (tattoo), va'a outrigger canoe voyaging, oral genealogy and reverence for marae, the sacred stone temple sites. Craft knowledge of tapa bark cloth and pandanus weaving is passed down within families. This is deep, widely practised living heritage.