Marking International Day for the Conservation of Mangrove Ecosystems: Why It Matters

Every 26th of July, we celebrate International Mangrove Day. a date officially recognized by UNESCO in 2015 to honor these vital coastal ecosystems.  But why is this day so significant? Mangroves, often referred to as coastal guardians, play a crucial role in protecting our shorelines and supporting diverse ecosystems. Today, as we commemorate this day, it's essential to reflect on the journey and the efforts made to secure the rights of mangroves and recognize the activists who championed this cause.

Source: National Marine Sanctuary Foundation

Far beyond UNESCO’s celebration of Mangrove Day, the 26th of July was celebrated in Ecuador as early as 1998. On that day, FUNDECOL, Greenpeace International, and the Muisne communities participated in a demonstration to tear down an unauthorized shrimp pond to return the area to its natural status as a mangrove forest.

Source: World Food Program USA

In many communities, mangroves are often cleared out to make room for shrimp aquaculture. As of 2020, 238.319 hectares of mangroves have been lost due to conversion for shrimp farming (WWF, 2020). Stripping coastlines off from their guardian provides a protective shield to mitigate rising sea levels, high tides, erosions, and many more. Sadly, in the spirit of maintaining Mangrove rights, a Greenpeace activist from Micronesia, Hayhow Daniel Nanoto, died of a heart attack. 

For this reason, the 26th of July is commemorated as Mangrove Day to reflect on the important role mangroves play in communities and societies. Two years after Nanoto’s passing, the Ecuadorian government passed a law to outlaw the destruction of mangroves for shrimp farming. The legal instrument allows a foundation to crack down on unlisted shrimp farming operations and reforest the ecosystem with mangroves.

4 Long-term Threats to Mangrove Sustainability

Since Nanoto’s passing, people have been remembering this day and taking new action to save the mangroves. Worldwide action to protect mangroves are always underway to eliminate threats that would hamper mangrove’s sustainability. There are 4 things that may disrupt mangrove sustainability in the long term:

• Coastal Development

Coastal development may be the greatest threat to mangroves. Not only are woods lost when a coast is developed, but they are usually replaced by man-made structures. These structures could cause plenty of changes ranging from pollution to erosion. Rivers that originally flowed through mangroves before draining into the sea will become blocked or rerouted, causing changes in filtration, sedimentation, temperature, and salinity. These changes can have an impact on aquatic species that are important to coastal populations, limiting biodiversity within the mangrove ecosystem. 

• Extinction

Currently, there are more than 70 species of mangrove around the world. When other activities such as infrastructure development, shrimp farming and other harmful activities for mangrove are prioritized rather than the mangrove ecosystem, it may risk the number of overall mangrove species. While replanting mangroves could become a solution, many mangrove species are rare and slow-growing. Thus, replanting strategies would not be able to mimic the specific species and ecosystem within mangroves. 

• Climate Change

As the earth’s climate is getting warmer, it contributes in changing the world’s coastline through rapidly rising sea levels and changing the chemistry of the oceans. Mangrove trees, as the plants living in the area are directly implicated by the changing environment. These trees need specific conditions for living. For example, a change in the tidal waves will impact them because if they are continuously exposed with high tidal waves, they would not be able to release the ocean salts quickly from their system, causing the mangroves to wither and die. 

• Deforestation

Cutting down mangroves is one of the methods done to change land utilization, but also to utilize several parts of mangroves for their wood and leaves. Some might suggest reforestation as the solution to this issue. In response to this, Duke et. al., (2007) argue that the continuous cutting down and replanting of mangroves could lead to the extinction of several species of mangroves. These trees have very specific environmental living conditions, recreating this at planting sites would be difficult, especially when considering the complex seed dispersal processes endured by mangroves that are hard to replicate in new sites. 

Empowering Change: CarbonEthics' Commitment to Mangrove Conservation

As an individual, you might be wondering, what kind of efforts can you do in response to the threats facing mangroves? The answer is to increase your awareness! Those of you living in the city might be far-away from mangroves and become isolated from the issue, but mangroves are an important part of our ecosystem. Increase your knowledge by reading our blogs and increase your efforts to become more aware of contemporary challenges facing mangroves. 

Additionally, you could also help the cause by supporting CarbonEthics in our attempts for blue carbon development by simply sharing our posts or suggesting our assistance to your family and friends. In the spirit of protecting mangroves, CarbonEthics provides services that focus on maintaining their ecological sustenance. We believe that mangrove is a solution to climate change as they serve as a major source of carbon sequester. Thus, we have worked hard to achieve such aims by not only focusing on mangrove protection but to simultaneously engaging local communities and biodiversity. Both are an essential aspect that interrelates with Mangrove that cannot be separated from one another. 

CarbonEthics planting site at Dompak

Since 2019, CarbonEthics has been working to restore mangrove forests in Indonesia's coastal regions. Farmer communities, such as our partners in Dompak, are benefiting from our community-based conservation activities by having a source of income during hard times. With 82 indirect beneficiaries in total through the first half of 2021, we have engaged 26 farmers or 30.7% of whom are women. Did you know that you could also adopt a mangrove tree for yourself? Help to boost mangrove growth in Indonesia and buy a mangrove tree from us through this link.

References:

Wit (2021) International Mangrove Day: Moratorium Momentum?, KEHATI. Available at: https://kehati.or.id/en/international-mangrove-day-moratorium-momentum/ (Accessed: 23 July 2024). 

Aronson, M. (2020) Mangroves are at Risk, Companies Can Help by Transforming Shrimp Farming, WWF Seafood Sustainability. Available at: https://seafoodsustainability.org/mangroves-are-at-risk-companies-can-help-by-transforming-shrimp-farming/ (Accessed: 23 July 2024). 

Ecuador outlaws mangrove destruction for shrimp farming, edie. Available at: https://www.edie.net/ecuador-outlaws-mangrove-destruction-for-shrimp-farming/ (Accessed: 23 July 2024). 

Threats to mangroves (no date) ELAW. Available at: https://elaw.org/mangroves-threats (Accessed: 24 July 2024).