Why Jakarta is sinking

The 400-year curse dragging Indonesia's capital into the sea.

Like many coastal cities around the world, Jakarta is dealing with sea level rise. But Indonesia's biggest city also has a unique problem: Because of restricted water access in the city, the majority of its residents have to extract groundwater to survive. And it's causing the city to sink. Today, Jakarta is the world’s fastest-sinking city.

The problem gets worse every year, but the root of it precedes modern Indonesia by centuries. In the 1600s, when the Dutch landed in Indonesia and built present-day Jakarta, they divided up the city to segregate the population. Eventually, that segregation led to an unequal water piping system that excluded most Indigenous Jakartans, forcing them to find other ways to get water.

To understand how it all ties together, and what’s in store for Jakarta’s future, watch the video above.

Sources and further reading:

If you want to learn more about the development of Jakarta’s urban water supply going all the way back to colonial times, check out Michelle Kooy’s detailed reports:

To read about the evolution of the canals the Dutch built in present-day Jakarta and how their deterioration impacted water access and segregation, here’s a study from Dr. Euis Puspita Dewi, who we feature in the video:

Thanks for watching and let us know what you think in the comments!

[Vox]

Hello! We have translated subtitles available in Bahasa Indonesia. You can access them through the settings icon > Subtitles/CC

Thanks for watching, and let me know what other colonial histories you want to see explained next in the comments.

Thanks, Christina, Video Producer

[bluesky]

as indonesian this particular problem never being aired in our national television, but foreign media always give a information about this problem maybe most of indonesian will never know about jakarta is sinking. so thank you Vox.

[danyuda]

what saddens me is our national media doesn’t even produce such amazing educational video like this

[mayu]

As someone from Jakarta, we all know this is happening, but no one seems to care enough to do anything about it. It seems like foreign media cares more and we've just accepted defeat.

[dark_]

Melihat bapak2 ni kata “mahu kemana lagi”..hati saya jadi sayu😔..moga dipermudahkan semuanya..salam dari Msia🇲🇾..

[porc]

Scientist: Jakarta is sinking!

Indonesian media: Look what this celebrity is gonna do today!

[sharizashaari]

How irony it is that "the city is sinking because the people living in it don't have enough water"

[nikolasao]

As always the poor people are the ones that end up suffering.

[ZeeengMicro]

Floods?
You mean the annual Jakarta public waterpark?
It gets so popular we almost hold it every month now.

[HappyfoxBiz]

"we are moving the capitol of Indonesia"
me: "we are moving the rich people again, good luck everybody else"

[burntcinnabun]

This is actually the first logical explanation of Jakarta's sinking problem I've heard of, and it's not even from Indonesian media. People here either blame a "mystical force" or a neighboring city. Thank you!

[Dear_Mr._Isaiah_Deringer]

Indonesian government considering moving their capital.
Indonesian Government: _We are gonna do what's in the profession called a dutch move._

[KatsyFNF]

As someone who's Indonesian and has been to Jakarta multiple times, I can say the ground water pumping thing is accurate and has become a real problem. This definitely needs to reach to Jakarta at some point as news, but from what I've seen, it's been neglected for the longest time, and as long as you can make a living in Jakarta, nobody will care. People need to do something.

[vincentrcrd]

Watching this while reading "flooding" is trending again on twitter.

[veeneemaas]

This is shown how history repeats it self. “Leave it, and build another problematic city” . Ignorance at it’s finest.

[whatdadogdoin_]

the way this was posted while jakarta is literally drowning with floods because of high rain intensity for the last couple of days....

edit: i hope everyone stay safe😔

[anarghyasumanth]

When the capital is in crisis, the politicians have a great response by moving the capital to a new city. Now the capital does not have a crisis.

Egypt is doing the same thing too!

[EpicAsian]

Jakarta - we are sinking
Indonesia - it’s time to sink about the future

Ps, i wish all Indonesians 100% safety and healthy!

[parvadhami]

Even the Indonesian government acted like the Dutch: Shift the capital somewhere else and leave the citizens behind

[veronicaangela]

and as indonesian students, we're all taught that the primary cause of floods is littering.