An internationally recognized mangrove scientist pushed for the establishment of coastal greenbelts with lush mangroves to protect coastal communities from natural calamities such as storm surges, while allowing the denuded mangroves to recover.
The coastal greenbelt is the measure to prevent coastal erosion and reduce other natural hazards by planting trees and creating mangrove forests along the coasts.
Dr. Jurgenne Primavera, chief mangrove scientific adviser for the Zoological Society of London (ZSL)- Philippines, based in Iloilo City said that other countries in Southeast Asia maintained some 2,000 meters of coastal greenbelt even in front of their shrimp pond, but this is not the case here in our country.
“In Thailand, there are one to two kilometers of greenbelt, in front of their shrimp pond. In the Philippines, maybe five meters the most or zero meter behind the fishponds. Despite the fact that we have so many laws going back to 1975. These are really in the breach, rather than in the compliance,” she said in her Webinar Lecture on Mangroves: 101 participated by this writer.
Dr. Primavera explained that mangroves are valuable resources, not only as coastal protection, but to many other significant uses. In fact, a hectare of mangroves has a value of US$14,166 to US$16,142 based on the value of ecosystem services of mangroves (Barbier et al, 2011).
Ironically, as fishponds increase, mangroves also have gone down. In case of Pangasinan province, they have 450,000 hectares of mangrove forest in 1918, however it shrank to only 240,000 hectares in 2003. This drastically, make the mangrove-fishpond ratio to parity.
“The present mangrove-fishpond ratio is 1:1. The ideal should be 4:1 for mangrove hectare and fishpond hectare for ecological sustainability. Obviously, we need to rehabilitate a lot of mangroves to bring back the 4:1 ratio,” Dr, Primavera further explained.
She further said that informal settlers in our country living in coastal areas build their houses on the seawater, therefore causing destruction and denudation to the once lush mangroves, paving the way to the houses sprouting within the coastlines. She observed that after supertyphoon Yolanda hit many parts of the country, the national government installed warning signages in storm surge prone coastal areas.
“We do not need these warning signs, we need greenbelts” Dr. Primavera said.
In 2014, a year after Yolanda, Senator Bam Aquino filed a bill in Senate providing for at least 100 meters greenbelt, all over the country. The same bill was also filed in the House of Representatives in 2015. However, both bills are still pending in both Congress.
In her presentation, Dr. Primavera showed the experience of Nicobar’s Island in India during 2004 Tsunami, the coastal areas without mangroves are completely devastated. In contrast, in coastal areas with greenbelts and lush mangroves intact, the communities are protected and saved from the tsunami’s fury.
Wind waves and swell waves too, or even storm surge, similar that hit Yolanda-battered provinces in 2013, but if there are greenbelts and mangroves intact, it will be saved hundreds or even thousand of lives, because of the mangroves’ significant role in coastal protection.
“They (mangroves) are bio-shields. If you want to reduce the wave energy by 13 to 60 percent you should have 100 meters of these greenbelt or half kilometer of greenbelt if you want to reduce strength of wind waves or swell waves by 100 percent. Haiyan or Yolanda is the strongest ever to make landfall in the history of the planet with storm surge of 10 meters high,” said Dr. Primavera.
Because of the significant role of mangroves and coastal greenbelt as protection, the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) has established 35 hectares greenbelt in Ajuy island in Panay.
For centuries, mangrove systems have contributed significantly to the well-being of coastal communities through their provision of a wide array of goods from forestry such as wood used for fuel, construction, and fishing poles, and forage for livestock, honey, and medicines. They are also important in fisheries with higher-valued fish, crustaceans and mollusks which they significantly fortify. But mangroves do not stop at being providers of essential goods; they also offer many ecosystem services including coastal protection provided by a buffer zone during typhoons and storm surges, reduction of shoreline and riverbank erosion, flood control, nutrient recycling and habitat for wildlife.
Due to the fast rate of the decline of our mangrove forest, a paradigm shift of the mindset of our leaders and decision makers are seen as our hope that can make a difference in protecting, conserving and saving our mangroves from man’s wanton abuse.
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