The Nauru government is calling for assistance from the international community for its land rehabilitation plan.
A video released by the government this week explains how phosphate mining on the island's central plateau has scarred the landscape leaving hard rock pinnacles that can't be built on or farmed.
As rising sea levels force Nauru's population to retreat to higher ground in the interior, the chairman of the Nauru Rehabilitation Corporation, Peter Jacob, says the country's future depends on remediating the land.
"That needs to leveled either through demolishing those rocks to make it smooth, or back filling with soil, or a combination of both."
Peter Jacob says the project is crucial to Nauru's long-term sustainability.
In 2012, an engineer told the ABC he quit the corporation in frustration, as funding from Australia for the project was being used by the Nauru government for other purposes.
The Nauru phosphate cantilever. Photo: Supplied/ Nauru Government Information Department