Two related things spanning two decades in my younger life came to mind when I got in my email a VISUAL CAPITALIST report early this week.
The Vancouver (Canada)-based VC is a fast-growing online publisher of data-driven visuals on global developments focused on technology, economy and energy, among others.
VC is known for creating and curating research-anchored visual content with high news value through the use of infographics and other data visualization approaches.
The two related reminders were the discussion in my Sociology class in the university (and that was in the early 1970s yet) that Iloilo City has been a noticeably sinking city and the other, the 1995 action-sci-fi film, “Water World”. The Kevin Costner-starrer movie essayed global life after the melting of polar ice caps, sending most parts of the world under water.
The VC infographic shows satellite-based radar data gathered between 2014 and 2020 on the fastest sinking cities of the world.
Four cities in Southeast Asia, including Manila, are listed, along with three other Asian urban centers.
Taking the No. 1 spot is Tianjin, a port city in northeastern China which has a population of over 14 million.
Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam (pop. 9.3 million) leads the threatened SEA cities at No. 2, with Yangon, Myanmar (5.6 million) at No. 4; Jakarta in Indonesia (11.2 million) at No. 5 and Manila (1.8 million, or 13.4 million to include the surrounding cities and towns) at No. 10.
The other Asian urban centers are Chittagong in Bangladesh (5.4 million) and the Indian city of Ahmedabad (8.7 million), sixth.
The rest of the cities in the list are in the bottom half of the Top 10 along with Manila – Istanbul in Turkiye (15.5 million), seventh; Houston in the United States (2.3 million), eighth: and Lagos in Nigeria (15.9 million), ninth.
Reports indicated that global sea levels have risen at least 8 inches between 1992 and 2100.
Greenpeace East Asia had earlier reported that the city of Manila may be submerged in seawater and coastal flood by 2030 if extreme sea level rises and storm surges occur.
Manila, along with Roxas City and Cotabato, are reportedly in the Top 10 East Asian cities that may be affected by sea level rise and storm surges.
Experts attribute the incidence of water surges and subsequent sinking of areas to, among others, the archipelagic nature of the Philippines and other parts of the world that are experiencing rising sea levels.
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Remember the late August 2023 rains spawned by Typhoon Goring? Bacolod, as a coastal city showed its vulnerability to the phenomenon when more than half of its 61 barangays went under water for days.
A report quoting Dr. Laura David of the U.P. Marine Science Institute indicated that more than half of the Filipinos – or 64 million living along coastal areas – face direct exposure to sea level rise and are threatened to lose “homes, livelihood or even lives.”
Communities in about 20 areas all over the country – and that include Negros Occidental and Iloilo – are likely to be exposed to extreme effects of rising sea level. Also, among those threatened in central Philippines are Visayan islands – Bohol, Samar and Cebu – as well as Palawan.
We hope to look further into this phenomenon, especially that climate change and the subsequent and continued melting of polar ice caps continue, sending more water to the ocean, thus threatening wider proportions of human lives and property – a watervworld in the making.
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Thus says the Lord: “Behold, waters are going to rise from the north, and become an overflowing torrent, and overflow the land and all its fullness, the city and those who live in it; and the men will cry out, and every inhabitant of the land will wail.” (Jeremiah 47:2) | NWI
