Indonesia unveils site of new capital. Find out why it is changing power centre

The Indonesian government on March 09 unveiled the site of its new capital city.

In 2022, President Joko Widodo announced that the capital will be moved from Jakarta to the island of Borneo.

Jakarta is home to about 10 million people and has been described as the world's most rapidly sinking city, and at the current rate, it is estimated that one-third of the city could be submerged by 2050.

The main cause is uncontrolled ground water extraction, but it has been exacerbated by the rising Java Sea due to climate change.

Its air and groundwater are heavily polluted, it floods regularly and its streets are so clogged that it's estimated congestion costs the economy USD 4.5 billion a year, news agency AP reported. Jakarta is also prone to earthquakes.

Widodo's plan to establish the new city of Nusantara — an old Javanese term meaning “archipelago” — will entail constructing mostly everything from scratch.

Indonesian officials say the new capital city will be a “sustainable forest city" that puts the environment at the heart of the development and aims to be carbon-neutral by 2045.

But environmentalists warn that the capital will cause massive deforestation, threaten the habitat of endangered species such as orangutans and imperil the homes of Indigenous communities.

The city is expected to be inaugurated on Aug. 17 next year to coincide with Indonesia's Independence Day. New capital authorities said that the final stages of the city, however, likely won't be completed until 2045, marking the nation's hundredth anniversary.

(with AP inputs)