Indonesia to Move Capital From Jakarta to Brand New ‘Forest’ City

Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia, is congested, polluted, and sinking into the ocean. The nation’s government wants to leave it. Indonesia is in Southeast Asia. Jakarta is the region's largest city. 31 million people live in its metro region.

Officials have come up with a plan to move the capital 1,200 miles to the north. The city will be built from scratch. The area where it will be built is currently a jungle. The new city will be called Nusantara. In Javanese that means “archipelago.”

“The (building) of the new capital city is not merely a physical move of government offices,” Indonesian President Joko Widodo told The Associated Press. “The main goal is to build a smart new city…based on a green economy.”

Widodo is referred to as Jokowi.

Planners hope to complete Nusantara’s central government district and fill it with 8,000 employees by 2024. Jokowi hopes to move there by the end of next year. The entire move would be finished by 2045.

Some think Jokowi’s “sustainable forest city” is absurd. Those critics worry about the environment. The city will be on the island of Borneo. Environmentalists say the building of the city will speed up tree loss. They also say it will put wildlife in danger.

"It's going to be a(n)…ecological disaster," an advocate told Agence France-Presse.

Others wonder what will happen to the people who will be left in Jakarta. 

Photo by yohanes budiyanto courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.