Atolls of The Maldives - Island Environment

Island Environment

The islands in the atolls of the Maldives rest on the shelf provided by the reefs. Many reefs have no islands at all. But all islands in the Maldives have an underlying coralline reef. Usually islands are flat and sandy. Often there is a rocky bottom made up of a coral rock conglomerate underneath the island proper. Some islands are long and sandy while others have a rounder shape. The round islands often are lower in the centre, sometimes having a muddy or marshy spot.

Islands may disappear when the currents on the reef change. Maldivians call this phenomenon of erosion giramun dhiyun. New islands also may appear, beginning as sandbanks or coral gravel heaps at another location of the reef (a phenomenon that is known among Maldivians as vodemun dhiyun). Therefore, in the Maldives, islands are constantly eroding and constantly being formed. Human action, in the form of jetties or the dredging of channels on the reef, may change the pattern of currents on the reef and accelerate erosion.

The atolls in Maldives are often separated from each other by vast expanses of the deepest ocean; but despite the great distances, the daily life of Maldivians in the individual inhabited islands shows very few differences all along the length of the atoll chain.

Except for the capital, Malé (pop. 90,000), the environment in most islands is dominated by practically the same small number of ingredients: trees of a few types, low houses with small yards, the waterside always close at hand and almost no dramatic variations in the landscape. The Maldives has about 200 inhabited islands. The typical population is about 300 inhabitants per island, distributed in about fifty households.