Indonesia 'stands to lose 2,000 islands'

Rising sea levels because of global warming stand to inundate about 2,000 islands in Indonesia by 2030, the country’s environment minister said today.

The assessment by Rachmat Witoelar was the bleakest yet by the government of the affects of global warning on the mostly poor nation, which is made up of 18,000 islands, most of them uninhabited.

“It is very, very serious,” he told a media conference attended by Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the UN climate treaty secretariat

He said respected scientific studies showed about 2,000 islands would be swallowed by 2030. He did not say whether the threatened islands were inhabited or not.

Delayed rains this year followed by a spell of hot weather would also hurt farmers, a weather upset Witoelar said was down to global warming.

“It is feared there will be a lack of rice production next year because of the changes in the weather and because the farmers are not used to this,” he said.