A recent project to farm black pearl oysters has been successful at generating additional income for the island's people.

A sizable proportion of the Nukuoro population have relocated from the atoll in recent years, with diaspora communities throughout Micronesia, the United States, and elsewhere in the world, but especially on the island of Pohnpei, to which there is continuous migration today.

[4] According to oral tradition, the atoll was first settled by migrants originating from Samoa, led by a man named Vave, who remains an important figure in Nukuoro culture.

[4] In general, Polynesian Outlier communities are thought to have been established after the settlement of Polynesia proper, as a result of backwash migrations and drift voyages.

[6] What is known of the history of Nukuoro Atoll prior to European contact comes from the oral tradition, and narratives have occasionally been recorded and published by Western visitors.

[7] The first sighting recorded by Europeans was by Spanish naval officer Juan Bautista Monteverde on 18 February 1806 commanding the frigate San Rafael of the Royal Company of the Philippines.

The statues represent gods and deified ancestors who are associated with the five Nukuoro family groups: sekave, seala, sehege, sehena, and seolo.

[13] They are known for their ovoid heads, faint or blank facial features, sloping shoulders, and geometric chests, buttocks, and legs.

[7] At least nine of these sculptures were collected by Johann Stanislaus Kubary, a Polish naturalist and ethnographer who visited the atoll in 1873 and 1877 as a collector for the Museum Godeffroy in Hamburg.