The encroaching ocean laps against a road in Karminah's village, threatening her home on Indonesia's Java island, where the government says it has a plan to hold back the tide.

It wants to build an $80-billion, 700-kilometre (435-mile) seawall along Java's coast to tackle land loss as climate change lifts sea levels and groundwater extraction prompts land to sink.

For residents who have seen the tide come more than a kilometre inland in parts of Java, the plan sounds like salvation.

But with a timeline of decades and uncertain financing, it looks unlikely to arrive quickly enough, and climate experts warn it could make matters worse by pushing erosion elsewhere and disrupting ecosystems.

For Karminah, 50, those concerns feel distant.

"What's important is that it doesn't flood here. So that it's comfortable," she told AFP in Bedono village, referring to a coastal road that disappears almost daily.

"School can't happen, the children can't play, they can only sit on the pavement staring at the water."

The government calls the colossal wall one of its "most vital" initiatives to help coastal communities in Java, which houses more than half of Indonesia's 280 million citizens, as well as fast-sinking capital Jakarta.

Bedono........

© International Business Times