Small Island Developing States facts for kids

A map of the Small Island Developing States.

3rd International conference of Small Island Developing States meeting in Samoa, September 2014.

Small Island Developing States (SIDS) are low-lying coastal countries. They share similar problems because of their size. Some of these problems are: small but growing populations, limited resources, and long distances from other countries.

The SIDS were first seen as a distinct group of developing countries at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in June 1992. The Barbados Programme of Action was made in 1994 to help the SIDS to develop.

List of SIDS

Currently, the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs lists 52 small island developing states. These are broken down into three geographic regions: the Caribbean; the Pacific; and Africa, Indian Ocean, Mediterranean and South China Sea (AIMS). Each of these regions has a regional organisation for cooperation: the Caribbean Community, the Pacific Islands Forum and the Indian Ocean Commission.

Caribbean	Pacific	AIMS
Anguilla ^{3, 4, 7}	American Samoa ^{2, 6, 7}	Bahrain ^{3, 6}
Antigua and Barbuda	Cook Islands ⁷	Cape Verde ⁶
Aruba ^{3, 5, 7}	Federated States of Micronesia	Comoros ¹
The Bahamas	Fiji	Guinea-Bissau ^{1, 6}
Barbados	French Polynesia ^{3, 4, 7}	Maldives ⁵
Belize	Guam ^{2, 6, 7}	Mauritius
British Virgin Islands ^{3, 4, 7}	Kiribati ¹	São Tomé and Príncipe ^{1, 6}
Cuba ⁶	Marshall Islands	Seychelles
Dominica	Nauru	Singapore ⁶
Dominican Republic ⁵	New Caledonia ^{3, 4, 7}
Grenada	Niue ⁷
Guyana	Northern Mariana Islands ^{3, 6, 7}
Haiti ¹	Palau
Jamaica	Papua New Guinea
Montserrat ^{3, 7}	Samoa ¹
Netherlands Antilles ^{2, 5, 7}	Solomon Islands ¹
Puerto Rico ^{3, 5, 7}	Timor-Leste ^{1, 3, 5}
Saint Kitts and Nevis	Tonga
Saint Lucia	Tuvalu ¹
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines	Vanuatu ¹
Suriname
Trinidad and Tobago
United States Virgin Islands ^{2, 6, 7}

1. Also a Least developed country
2. Observer of the Alliance of Small Island States
3. Not a member or observer of the Alliance of Small Island States
4. Associate member of regional cooperation body
5. Observer of regional cooperation body
6. Not a member or observer of regional cooperation body
7. Not a member of the United Nations