Image by Moh Tamimi/Mongabay Indonesia. Retrieved from news.mongabay.com
The land weighed on Mateus Bhui as he sifted the Rendubutowe soil through his fingers into a traditional container.
“To our ancestors: please don’t be angry,” Mateus said, repeating the lament as he clasped another handful of earth. “I never wanted to sell this land.”
Mateus leads the Woe Dhiri Ke’o, one of several Indigenous communities in Rendubutowe, a rugged upland of Indonesia’s Flores Island, traversed by generations of farmers, herders and weavers.
Soon, however, Matheus’s home will be the site of a 1.4 trillion rupiah ($88 million) reservoir, which is needed to provide water for the population of the wider Nagekeo district.
A decade ago, Indonesia’s public works ministry drew up a blueprint for a network of seven dams to help quench the thirst afflicting much of East Nusa Tenggara province during its punishing dry season.
“East Nusa Tenggara is in dire need of reservoirs to cope with the water shortage faced by humans, animals and plants,” the ministry reported in 2015.
A recent review in the journalWater Supply of 100 academic studies published from 2000-2023 concluded that “climate change possesses serious threats on Indonesia’s water resources in the future unless it is anticipated and tackled properly.”