300px, Map of the Reef Islands
Pileni is a culturally important island in the
Reef Islands
The Reef Islands are a loose collection of 16 islands in the northwestern part of the Solomon Islands province of Temotu. These islands have historically also been known by the names of Swallow Islands and Matema Islands.
Geography
The islan ...
, in the northern part of the
Solomon Islands
Solomon Islands is an island country consisting of six major islands and over 900 smaller islands in Oceania, to the east of Papua New Guinea and north-west of Vanuatu. It has a land area of , and a population of approx. 700,000. Its capit ...
province of
Temotu. Despite its location in
Melanesia
Melanesia (, ) is a subregion of Oceania in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It extends from Indonesia's New Guinea in the west to Fiji in the east, and includes the Arafura Sea.
The region includes the four independent countries of Fiji, Va ...
, the population of the islands is
Polynesian.
Pileni has a population of below 300 inhabitants and is around wide and long. It is vulnerable to tsunamis and the sea level rising.
History
The first church in Pileni was set up in the 1930s. The island was hit by cyclones in the 1950s, 1985 and 1993, and a tsunami struck the island in 1990. An extension school was set up on the island in 2002, the classroom of which is the island's only permanent building. From 2000, there has been a reported shortage of fish and shellfish, and some fruit trees have died.
Economy
Per household, the average monthly income is between
SI$51 and SI$200. Some households sell pigs to increase their income.
Language
Pileni once gave its name to the
Samoic-Outlier language spoken there. What used to be called ''Pileni'' is now more commonly referred to under its native name
Vaeakau-Taumako
Vaeakau-Taumako (formerly known as ''Pileni'') is a Polynesian language spoken in some of the Reef Islands as well as in the Taumako Islands (also known as the Duff Islands) in the Temotu province of the Solomon Islands.
The language is spoke ...
.
References
External links
POLLInet* https://web.archive.org/web/20080120074303/http://solomonislands.com.sb/pileni.html
Islands of the Solomon Islands
Polynesian outliers
{{Solomons-geo-stub
