Category: News May 2022

24 May, 2022 – By Willy Phillips

Cities around the world are sinking. 

Climate change and the ever-growing need for freshwater have taken their toll on metropolitan areas from Lagos, Nigeria, to Houston, Texas.

Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia, is no exception. The densely populated capital city is sinking at about 17 cm a year, the fastest globally. With 10 million city inhabitants and over 32 million in the greater metropolitan area, the most populated archipelago city has trouble on the horizon. By 2050, one-third of the city will be uninhabitable due to flooding.

In Jakarta, the sinking results from climate change and groundwater pumping. Climate change contributes to higher average temperatures and sea levels, while the need for freshwater drives underground extraction, causing the land to sink. As the city continues to grow, demands for drinking water will rise. Sea levels show no sign of halting their vertical march, leaving many wondering what solutions are to come. 

The current President of Indonesia, Joko Widodo, has unveiled plans to address the sinking city by moving the capital to the neighboring island of Borneo. While this solution may solve the immediate crisis, the required 1,000 sq miles (256k hectares) of land and $34 billion of foreign investment in Eastern Borneo raise significant social, ecological, and geopolitical problems. Dwi Sawung, of the Indonesian NGO WALHI, notes three fundamental areas for concern with the plan: “threats to water systems and risks of climate change, threats to flora and fauna, and threats of pollution and environmental damage.” 

Opponents have called it proof of “the government’s inability to solve the complex problems of Jakarta.” Many have shown their dissent, including 95% of the government officials required to move, and several local communities of eastern Borneo that will be displaced to accommodate the influx of 9,000 new government workers and infrastructure. Transplanting the capital appears to create more problems than it solves and may exist as a temporary solution to much larger and persistent problems like resource insecurity and social injustice.

Jakarta is not alone in the context of land insecurity and instability. Regions worldwide are learning to mitigate the myriad new challenges posed by climate change. However, as situations like this become more commonplace, we hope that Jakarta will serve as a lighthouse model for climate change mitigation from which the world can learn. 

24 May 2022 – by Ella Kiyomi Dobson

In the first five months of 2022, Mozambique was hit by five tropical storms and cyclones that devastated many regions of the country. In March, the most recent storm – tropical cyclone Gombe – impacted at least 700,000 people. Moreover, it fully or partially destroyed homes, health centers, electricity systems, water systems, and almost 100,000 hectares of arable land and crops. Gombe is just one example of many extreme weather events that have shattered communities across Mozambique this past year. 

While scientists still cannot say with high levels of confidence that there are specific long-term trends in the frequency of tropical cyclones, the IPCC report released in August 2021 suggests that the incidence of stronger cyclones is likely over the next few years. Due to Mozambique’s coastal geography, the country is at heightened risk of these intensified cyclones and floods, and droughts due to the extensive coastline on which over half the population lives. In addition, the short recovery time experienced by communities across Mozambique between one extreme weather event to the next heightens the socio-economic impacts experienced and furthers issues of food insecurity, access to healthcare, housing security, and education. 

These climate risks have amplified effects in specific regions due to the ongoing violence and instability due to the insurgency that began in 2017. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, in 2020, there were over 650,000 people displaced by violence in northern Mozambique. In 2022, the UN notes that 6000 people were recorded as newly displaced due to a resurgence in violence. Vulnerability to displacement will only increase with the growing incidences of compounding effects, and with a lack of resources, more and more populations will become affected.