lānaʻi
Lānaʻi is the 6th largest island in the State and since 2012, is 98%-owned by Larry Ellison, founder and CEO of Oracle Corporation and founder of Pūlama Lānaʻi, the island’s land and resource management company. The remaining 2% of the island is owned by the State, Maui County, and by private landowners.
Formerly the site of one of the world’s largest pineapples farms (owned by the Hawaiian Pineapple Company, later the Dole Food Company), the island now primarily depends on tourism as its economic driver due to the two Four Seasons resorts in operation. Other facilities on the island include Lānaʻi High and Elementary School, Lānaʻi Community Hospital, and the Lānaʻi Community Health Center, in addition to various small locally-owned businesses and community service organizations.
Historically, the population of the island has changed in direct relation to the scale of the pineapple plantations and then the resorts. With an estimated 200 residents in 1890, the population saw significant Filipino and Japanese immigration as the pineapple industry grew, but a decreased need for field laborers due to mechanization led to a dip in the population after World War II. The increase in the 1990’s and 2000s came with the opening of two resorts in the early 1990s and the increased availability of accommodation, food services, and entertainment jobs.
Top community priorities include creating more affordable housing options on County-owned land (especially for kupuna), expanding the on-island healthcare system to improve community health and create more job opportunities outside the tourist industry, improving food security by supporting local farmers, and piloting a new visitor model to enhance community relations and promote sustainable tourism.
The Lanai data provided below should be used with caution due to the small size of the island’s population. Certain data sources suppress results that do not reach a certain threshold, as in the case of DBEDT not publishing unemployment data when it falls below 50 individuals and Hawaii Data Exchange Partnership suppressing data is a variable falls below 10 students. American Community Survey estimates, used to generate several charts below, are also less accurate for smaller populations due to being based on a very small sample. DBEDT labor force data (except for unemployment rate) is rounded to the nearest 50, which more significantly impacts the accuracy of this data for Lanai than for islands with larger labor force numbers.
Population, Lāna’i, 1950-2020
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Decennial Census Data
Population by Race*, Lāna’i, 2023 Estimates
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates [hyperlink: https://data.census.gov/table/ACSDP5Y2023.DP05?g=060XX00US1500992070]
Annual Visitor Arrivals by Air, Lāna’i, 1990 to 2023
Source: DBEDT Tourism Data Warehouse [https://dbedt.hawaii.gov/visitor/tourismdata/]
Estimated Jobs by Industry, Lāna’i, 2023
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates [https://data.census.gov/table/ACSDP5Y2023.DP03?g=060XX00US1500992070]
Annual Average Labor Force and Unemployment Rate, Lāna’i, 2000 to 2023
Source: DBEDT Unemployment Statistics [https://dbedt.hawaii.gov/economic/unemployment-statistics/]
College and Career Readiness Indicators, Lāna’i High School, Class of 2017 to 2023
Source: Hawaii Data Exchange Partnership, College and Career Readiness Indicators Dashboard [https://www.hawaiidxp.org/data-products/college-and-career-readiness-indicators/#compare]
Number of Single Family Home Sales and Median Sales Price, Lāna’i, 2014 – 2024
Source: Realtors Association of Maui [hyperlink: https://www.ramaui.com/housing-statistics]