Together with seagrass beds and salt marshes,
mangrove forests such as the one pictured account for 70% of the ocean's
carbon storage capacity.
Mangrove forests, seagrass beds and salt marshes cover only around 0.5% of the seabed, but account for some 70% of the ocean's carbon storage capacity.
These three marine environments soak up and store carbon dioxide in
their biomass and sediments, where they keep it locked up for centuries.
Together with the carbon held in the rest of the ocean, this is known
as 'blue carbon'.
Blue carbon is also the name of a new strategic approach to make use
of the large carbon capture and storage potential of coastal ecosystems.
If this carbon could be quantified and sold on international carbon
trading markets, this could help fund preservation and restoration
projects, which would also help capture more carbon and ease the effects
of climate change.
Apart from sequestering carbon quicker than the same area of
rainforests can, these three ecosystems provide other 'eco-services'
which are especially valuable for vulnerable coastal communities in
developing countries. These include food and energy, protecting
shorelines from flood and tsunamis, filtering water, as well as
recreation and tourism.
But aquaculture, agricultural development and pollution are now
responsible for loss of these ecosystems at a rate of up to four times
that of rainforest loss. Around 20% of mangroves and more than 50% of
seagrass ecosystems have been lost in the last 25 years, and salt
marshes are being lost at a rate 1 to 2% per year.
Because of the huge amount of carbon stored
in mangroves, the global emissions from mangrove deforestation account
for around 10% of all emissions from deforestation, despite making up
just 0.7% of tropical forest area.
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