Moving to Funafuti

Today we look at moving to Funafuti in Tuvalu from Dushanbe in Tajikistan. We highlight cost of living and other major differences likely to be experienced in our series of short blogs on moving between different international locations.
In Funafuti people speak Tuvaluan and English. In Dushanbe people speak Tajik, Uzbek and Russian.

Funafuti is an atoll that forms the capital of the island nation of Tuvalu. Dushanbe is the capital and largest city of Tajikistan. Funafuti has an airstrip, hotel (Vaiaku Langi Hotel), and administrative buildings, as well as homes, constructed both in the traditional manner, out of palm fronds, and more recently out of cement blocks. Coal, lead, and arsenic are mined nearby in the cities of Nurek and Kulob allowing for the industrialization of Dushanbe. The Nurek Dam, the world's highest as of 2008, generates 95% of Tajikistan's electricity.
The overall cost of living rank in Funafuti is 144 out of 300 global locations, which equates it with middle cost of living locations.  An expatriate moving from Dushanbe to Funafuti will experience a change in cost of living of 35.3%.

In terms of the hardship people are likely to experience, assessed in global terms, Funafuti is ranked as a high degree of hardship location with a hardship index of 30% compared to Dushanbe with a hardship index of 40% which is an extreme hardship location.

Source: Cost of Living Funafuti Tuvalu as at July 2011.