The Maldives is racing to create new land. Why are so many people concerned?

Not far from Shaiz’s hotel, a sea wall stretches towards the horizon, protecting a new swathe of land made of sand and coral debris. Coastal protection efforts such as the sea wall — and the changes wrought by reclamation — could have long-lasting effects on the processes that keep the islands from eroding, say researchers.

Like other atolls, the Maldivian islands evolve with the seasons, with monsoons moving sand around them. Between December and February, the winds transport sand from the northeast to the southwest. Between June and August, the pattern reverses.

“In a natural island, you will see seasonally the sand shifting with the waves and the currents,” says Mohamed. But reclamation can impede this process, he adds, by taking sand and coral debris from some locations through dredging — leaving a deficit in its wake — and depositing it where natural flows wouldn’t. Some projects add another complication by building hard barriers, such as sea walls, to protect the land, because they can stop the natural flow of sediments.

“Ecosystems can adapt if we allow them to,” says van Wesenbeeck at Deltares. “By interfering, you will kill the whole system in the end.”

Not only does this change how the island naturally maintains itself, but it can also draw development to places that are at a high risk of a storm surge or erosion, say some researchers.

“Islands can’t occur anywhere,” says Virginie Duvat, a coastal geographer at La Rochelle University in France, who has studied the effects of land reclamation in the Maldives. “If you put an island where there was naturally no island, you create vulnerable land and you will necessarily have to build strong engineered structures, breakwaters and sea walls,” she says.