Geoscience Reference
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communities in Bangladesh and India, which will suffer from inundation and
increasing frequency of storm-related intrusions.
Indonesia, with a population of 240 million and including territory spread
across 17,000 islands, is especially vulnerable. Some 1.1 per cent of Indonesia's
population lives in the one-metre low elevation zone, and 6.4 per cent in the
three-metre zone prone to coastal flooding in a Four Degree World. This would
imply the potential displacement of up to 15 million people in the latter instance.
Malley (2011) suggests that rising sea levels will also severely affect coastal cities,
where sea-level rise and subsidence caused by depletion of groundwater tables
would combine to increase the vulnerability of the densely populated north coast
of Java. Changes in marine conditions would pose a significant threat to coastal
fisheries, a major source of food in Indonesia.
If temperatures rise rapidly, Indonesia will experience a decline in production
of its staple food crop - rice. Java produces half of Indonesia's rice crop. It is likely
to suffer longer, drier seasons, reducing the capacity for multiple harvests each
year. These factors, among others, are likely to exacerbate already entrenched
socio-economic divisions, increase pressure on government for ameliorative
and adaptation support, and potentially lead to internal political destabili-
zation. Malley (2011) suggests three responses are possible: persistence despite
calamity; internal immigration - continuing and exacerbating a pattern that has
been evident in Indonesia for many decades; and emigration to neighbouring
countries (under peaceful circumstances, he assumes). He also suggests that state
failure is unlikely 'in the next twenty years'.
The survival of certain Pacific countries is at extreme risk from sea-level
rise. More than 50 per cent of the region's population lives within 1.5 km of
the shoreline. Many islands are less than a few meters above sea level. Thus,
an increase of as little as half a metre, along with increased storm surges, would
completely inundate many critical areas and threaten their populations (IPCC,
2007). Global warming of 4°C could entail a sea-level rise of up to 1 metre by
2100 and much more over time. Even if warming were limited to 2°C, global
average sea levels would continue to rise by up to 1.5 to 4 metres by 2300
(Schellnhuber et al., 2012: xv).
The risks and impacts of sea-level rise differ regionally and between low (e.g.
atoll) and high (e.g. volcanic) islands. Low islands are much more vulnerable to
saltwater contamination of both groundwater and soils. Seawater intrusion into
underground water aquifers is already experienced by many coastal communities.
Both low and high islands are equally vulnerable to sea-level rise, due to the
concentration of human activity in coastal areas and the difficulty in relocating
to the interior of high islands (Barnett and Campbell, 2010). These represent
acute security threats to low-lying atoll Pacific nations. As the Vice-President
of the Republic of Palau, Elias Camsek Chin, declared in his address to the UN
General Assembly in 2008: 'Never before in all history has the disappearance of
whole nations been such a real possibility … This is a security matter which has
gone unaddressed.'
 
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