How mangrove forests helped stall environmental crime

After strip-mining for coal devastated Kentucky’s forests and planting grass didn’t revive Appalachia’s ecosystems, a federal employee reversed course and spearheaded an ambitious reforestation effort. By planting trees on used mine land, Patrick Angel and his nonprofit Green Forests Work are providing employment for out-of-work miners and are helping prevent frequent flooding. They have planted more than 187 million trees on about 275,000 acres of former min

Evidence shows that "community-run forests," or forests that are owned and managed by the people that live in the community are better for the environment. In a village in the Democratic Republic of Congo 300 people manage 5,000 hectares of forest. Data shows that the rate of deforestation in 57 community concessions like the one in the village was 23 percent lower than the national average. Community-run forests also provide financial means for the people In Guatemala a community-run generated 9,000 jobs and $6 million in revenue.

Tofino, a popular tourist destination in Clayoquot Sound, a region on the west coast of Vancouver Island, attracts about 600,000 annual visitors. The Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation and other Nuu-chah-nulth nations have created an eco-based tourism market. They are trying to restore the area after it was decimated by decades of logging in the area. The five central Nuu-chah-nulth First Nations took over tree-farm licenses and created Guardian programs, as well as restoration and monitoring projects. Tofino's tourism generated $250 million in profits, setting up a model that could be used by other First Nations.

The Cheakamus forest, which spans 33,000 hectares, is a community run forest, managed by the two First Nations and the city of Whistler, in British Colombia, Canada. By not logging massive amounts of wood, the forest keeps 15,000 tons of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere per year, the equivalent of the total emissions produced by 773 Canadians. The partners then sell those carbon offsets, generating about $100,000 in annual revenue a year. The move is one being done by community forests around the country and can provide an example of climate-based solutions that are economically beneficial.

The government of the Philippines is working with the Masungi Georeserve Foundation to restore wildlife and forests in a 2,700 hectares area of degraded land. They use a technique that focuses on the nurturing of native trees through natural practices. While the method takes longer to reforest an area than traditional ways, the initiative has planted 60,000 trees and employed 100 park rangers from the local communities that help protect the reserve.

The Colombian government has been working with regional regulatory agencies, the World Wildlife Fund, and local forest communities to encourage sustainable timber production and the implementation of forest management plans. They launched the Legal Wood Pact — a commitment with 69 entities to exclusively use wood from legal sources. While it can be difficult to convince people to purchase sustainable timber that’s more expensive, the sales of legal timber in the country increased from $500,000 in 2011 to $13 million in 2018.

In Kenya, initiatives are being devised to help the country reach a minimum tree cover target of 10% of the total landmass by 2022. One of the more successful efforts has been an uptick of public awareness campaigns such as the "adopt a tree campaign," which educates youth about the importance of planting trees in the correct areas.

The Nature Conservation Foundation is working to restore patches of rainforests in India that were degraded due to the expansion of plantations in the region. As the climate crisis continues, rainforests can play a key role in offsetting carbon dioxide emissions. By partnering with plantation companies, conservationists have been able to collect seeds from diverse rainforest tree species to grow in a nursery before planting the saplings in the degraded patches of land. However, the organization cautions against using restoration "as a crutch."

Prescribed burning or controlled burning is an ancestral indigenous practice in which specific sections of a forest are burned. Controlled burning also happens naturally like when lightning strikes a forest. Controlled burning is good for a forest, it gets rid of dead areas, leads to healthier soil by clearing the ground, and minimizes the strength of large fires. However, due to U.S. laws that criminalized controlled burns the practice was discouraged in the U.S. Now, due to climate change and larger fires, prescribed burning is making a come back.

Mangrove forests are known to be excellent storers of carbon and hosts of biodiversity, but they are also able to protect communities on coastlines from storm surge. However, many of the projects to restore these forests fail because they are rushed or planted in the wrong places. Scientists argue that organizers should focus on natural regrowth or “ecological mangrove restoration,” a science-based approach, which has been used in Indonesia and Guinea-Bissau.