World celebrates Mangroves Day

By
Sabrina Sohail
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World Mangroves Day
Mangrove Day is celebrated on the 26th of July to spread awareness for its protection

Paris, 26 July 2022 (TDI): Every year, on the 26th of July, World Mangroves Day is celebrated. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNSECO) titled this day as Mangroves day in 2015.

It is to raise awareness about the decline in the mangrove ecosystem and inform the world about the importance of this ecosystem. It also promotes looking out for solutions to conserve the ecosystem and preserve it with sustainability.

Mangrove Ecosystem

Mangroves are found between land and sea on coastal saline or brackish water. It is the only tree that can grow in saltwater. Their forests are found around the sheltered coastline in tropical or sub-tropical regions.

Mangrove forests are very rare. They represent less than 1% of tropical forests and less than 0.4% of total forests in the world. But they contribute a lot.

Importance of Mangroves

Although mangroves are rare, they play a very important role in protecting coastline communities and food security.

They act as a natural defense against hazards like storms, tsunamis, and rising sea levels and prevent soil from erosion.

Mangroves also help in fighting against climate change. The forests act as carbon sinks and are capable of sequestering a high amount of carbon.

They can take up to five times more carbon from the atmosphere than any other forest on land. One hector of mangrove forests can store 3754 tons of carbon. Moreover, mangrove forests protect biodiversity, too.

They provide a nursery habitat for fish, shellfish, and crustaceans. Furthermore, they have been protecting many endangered mammals, reptiles, and amphibians.

Threats to Mangroves

However, the mangroves are disappearing 3 to 5 times faster than other global forest losses. Exploitation and pollution are the major threats to mangroves.

According to Global Mangrove Alliance, an estimated 67% of mangroves have been lost or degraded to date, and an additional 1% is lost annually. Resultantly, mangroves’ coverage has been divided by two in the past 40 years.

United Nations’ Role

United Nations (UN) on the day, published that mangroves are the key to addressing the climate crisis as they can reduce its impacts. But they are under severe threat.

UN said that there was an urgent need to take action for the safeguard of this extraordinary ecosystem. Consequently, it called for people to together take action for the protection and conservation of mangroves.

UNESCO is working tirelessly to support the conservation of mangroves. It has included knowledge about mangroves in Biosphere Reserves, World Heritage sites, and UNESCO Global Geoparks to increase work for mangrove management.

It is engaged in implementing science-based solutions in coordination with local and indigenous communities for the protection of mangroves.

UNESCO is also looking for scientific solutions to preserve, protect, and restore these global blue carbon ecosystems.

 Global Mangroves Alliance

Global Mangroves Alliance is an ambitious initiative that seeks to increase global mangrove cover by 20% by 2030. It works in coordination with many NGOs, governments, and local communities.

It also explains that mangrove forests have fallen below 15 million hectares worldwide. Global Mangroves Alliance also celebrated Mangroves Day on Tuesday.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), an international organization working for nature conservation is one of GMA’s founding members.

It has facilitated several mangrove restoration projects in countries like Fiji, Vanuatu, Samoa, Solomon Islands, and Tonga.

Very recently, IUCN in collaboration with GMA worked on the development of the Mangrove Restoration Tracker Tool (MRTT) that can track mangrove restoration progress worldwide.