Environment-current issues: limited natural fresh water resources, roof storage tanks collect rainwater; intensive phosphate mining during the past 90 years-mainly by a UK, Australia, and New Zealand consortium-has left the central 90% of Nauru a wasteland and threatens limited remaining land resources
Environment-international agreements: party to: Biodiversity, Climate Change, Law of the Sea, Marine Dumping signed, but not ratified: none of the selected agreements
Geography-note: Nauru is one of the three great phosphate rock islands in the Pacific Ocean-the others are Banaba (Ocean Island) in Kiribati and Makatea in French Polynesia; only 53 km south of Equator
@Nauru:People
Population: 10,501 (July 1998 est.)
Age structure: 0-14 years: NA 15-64 years: NA 65 years and over: NA
Population growth rate: 1.33% (1998 est.)
Birth rate: 18.03 births/1,000 population (1998 est.)
Death rate: 5.1 deaths/1,000 population (1998 est.)
Net migration rate: 0.4 migrant(s)/1,000 population (1998 est.)