Will Maldives Islands sink by 2100? Mohamed Muizzu's govt pins hope on 'creating new land' but at a cost
Nature cited scientists as predicting that the islands in the Maldives could be completely submerged by 2100. “The Maldives is also one of the countries most vulnerable to sea-level rise," the article read. It added that 80 percent of its islands are less than one metre above sea level, and less than one percent of the area in the island nation is actually land.
ALSO READ: Maldives snubs India over hydrographic survey deal after signing military pact with China Meanwhile, an explanatory video posted by Nature on X (formerly Twitter) on April 27 stated that the “low-lying islands could become uninhabitable by 2050" because of the global sea level rising three to four millimetres per year. The capital, Malé, is one of the most densely populated parts of the planet. “The alleviation of the housing crisis in the Malé region is one of the key pledges of Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu's administration," a government press release had said in December last year.
It’s possible to walk across the entire island in 20 minutes. All the 1,200 islands in the Maldives are atolls – ring-shaped coral reefs, islands, or series of islets. ALSO READ: Indian tourists ditch Maldives amid row as numbers drop 40%; China arrivals up 200% The government is adopting a strategy called 'land reclamation'.
It is the process of creating new land from the sea, either by removing water from muddy areas or raising the level of the land. In the Maldives' case, the concept is simple. The island is expanding its territory by dredging up sediment from the ocean floor.
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