Abstract
The loss of blue carbon ecosystems results in significant levels of carbon emissions and decreased supply of other ecosystem services. West Africa contains approximately 14% of the world’s mangrove area but despite 25% of coverage loss between 1980 and 2006, the region’s mangroves have not been well studied. This study aims to provide a first step toward increasing the knowledge of the region’s blue carbon stocks, with a focus on mangroves, and of their financial value based on their carbon storage benefit alone. The best available data suggest that the region contains 1.97 million hectares of mangroves storing 854 million metric tons of carbon in above- and below-ground biomass and the top meter of soil; 4.8 million hectares of seagrass storing 673 million metric tons of carbon; and 1.2 million hectares of salt marshes storing 303 million metric tons of carbon. Even without including values for other benefits of intact mangroves, the conservation of mangroves in the region appears viable. Specifically, the discounted value of 20-year emission reductions under a conservation scenario is estimated to be between $341.2–569.0 million at an 8% discount rate and carbon prices of $3 and $5 per metric ton respectively.
Highlights
Coastal vegetated ecosystems, such as mangrove forests, seagrass meadows and salt marshes, have long provided benefits to human communities and fisheries, and in recent years have been recognized for the significant amounts of carbon (C) that they store and their contributions to mitigating climate change (Nellemann and Corcoran 2009; Barbier 2011)
To help fill that knowledge gap, this study aims to 1) synthesize the current state of information on the size and distribution of blue carbon’ (BC) stocks in West Africa’s mangrove forests, 2) estimate the size of payments that could be secured for maintaining BC stocks in mangroves, and 3) discuss the potential for communities and countries to secure BC payments from the international community in order to help implement the region’s mangrove conservation policy objectives as well as relevant targets of the Sustainable Development Goals
Relative salt marsh abundances within ecoregions is currently available (Hoekstra et al 2010) and an effort to develop a complete global dataset for salt marsh distribution is still underway at United Nations Environment Program (UNEP)-WCMC. (Halpern et al 2008) developed a dataset delineating salt marshes within 1 km of the shore collected over the period 1975–2007
Summary
Coastal vegetated ecosystems, such as mangrove forests, seagrass meadows and salt marshes, have long provided benefits to human communities and fisheries, and in recent years have been recognized for the significant amounts of carbon (C) that they store and their contributions to mitigating climate change (Nellemann and Corcoran 2009; Barbier 2011). University, Durham, NC, USA 3 Marine Geospatial Ecology Lab (MGEL), Nicholas School of the Environment, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA increased over the last 5 to 6 years, notably in the case of mangrove forests, as the international community has developed mechanisms to pay tropical countries to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from deforestation. These sources of international finance could potentially help tropical countries, where most of the world’s mangroves are found, to leverage global capital to fund the economic and financial costs of mangrove conservation, while capturing local benefits such as flood protection and fisheries support, among others.
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