Jakarta is sinking. The city’s return to the earth, at a rate of 10cm a year according the Bandung Institute of Technology, is anything except gentle.
The city had always been prone to annual flooding during the December to February rainy season, but not like this. In the first two weeks of 2020 alone, extreme inundations killed 66 residents and displaced hundreds of others.
When the floods have passed, the earthquakes and mudslides come. Overcrowding, mismanagement of resources and rising sea levels due to global warming have induced this rash of extreme events across Jakarta - and it will only get worse.
With...
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