Climate Change Archives - Respira International

Respira in Pakistan: Mangrove restoration on an immense scale

By Jen StebbingNews

Neatly planted mangroves stretch hundreds of thousands of hectares – a growing beacon of climate mitigation within a sea of containerships and fishing vessels. Bright green and full of life, these mangrove forests pose a striking juxtaposition to the industrialisation of Karachi’s port located at the far north of the project.

At the beginning of March, two members of our team were fortunate enough to visit Karachi – a sprawling microcosm of Pakistan and home to more than 20 million people. This was no tourist trip; CEO Ana Haurie and Director of Portfolio Management, Chris Villiers, were touching base with one of our flagship portfolio projects: Delta Blue Carbon.

Blue carbon refers to marine and coastal ecosystems – such as mangroves, seagrass meadows and tidal marshes – which can remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. We have recently published an article explaining the term and these ecosystems’ roles in climate mitigation if you would like to learn more.

Delta Blue Carbon currently holds an impressive record. As the world’s largest blue carbon project, it is working to conserve and restore mangrove forests across 350,000 hectares of tidal river channels off the southeast coast of the Province of Sindh. Reflecting on her first impressions of the project, Ana said:

“The scale of the project was massive and monumental. When you read or see a PowerPoint, it’s hard to get the full impact of the work these projects are doing. But when you visit a project first-hand, it becomes even more meaningful.”

Chris was also struck by the scale of the project:

“It’s hard to process the extent of the restoration,” he said, “Even spending two days on a boat, we touched only a tiny corner of it.”

The scale of mangrove operations

Such is the scale of operations in Karachi that Delta Blue Carbon has planned mangrove planting schedules stretching to 2029. These plans are ambitious – in 2023 alone, the team hopes to have planted an additional 20,000 hectares of land. Ana remarked on the sheer logistics of these plans:

“When you see the project up close, you realise it’s such a feat to actually get it done! That was another thing which dawned on me was the determination that you have to have to make something like this a reality – it’s so impressive,” she said.

This large-scale project is the result of a pioneering public private partnership between the government of Sindh and a private project developer, Indus Delta Capital. Both Ana and Chris observed that local governments participation has been instrumental to the project’s success.

With over 20 years of planting experience, the Government of Sindh’s Forestry Department has shared valuable knowledge on the most appropriate tree species for the region to ensure resilience and biodiversity benefit. Although four mangrove species are planted in the project area, Rhizophora and Evercinia are most common due to the prevalent local conditions. This highlights the importance of working with local experts who can ensure that reforestation is truly context specific and appropriate for the ecosystem in question.

A man in a pink shirt holds two green mangrove saplings. One is the species Rhizophora and the other is Evercinia.

Rhizophora and Evercinia mangrove saplings.

Community participation

An estimated 42,000 people live in the project area and the team are confident that at least 20,000 have, in a variety of ways, benefited from its existence. Chris and Ana explained the four main ways in which people can participate:

The planting season brings with it ample temporary employment opportunities. In teams of 20 to 30, people set out to plant mangrove saplings. They are not immune from competition – the team proudly declared that they hold the Guinness World Record for the most planting in a single day!
Others gain temporary employment as re-stockers. These teams sail out to areas planted 10 months previously to replace any trees which have failed to grow. From here, the mangroves move to a state of self-sufficiency as they are fantastic self-seeders. With the right conditions, each area can become densely populated within 5 years of planting.
Local families or other members of the community can also take their own initiative to supply propagules (mangrove seeds) to the project developer for future planting in return for payments. Paid by the bag load, propagule collecting has become rather popular in the area. Ana and Chris recount how they saw a group of men building a high bank on the mud flats that would act as a collection point for seeds they planned to gather in the coming weeks.
The community also puts forwards certain individuals to act as stewards of specific areas of the project through the Mangrove Stewardship Program. . These individuals sign an agreement to protect the planted areas from harm and receive a salary in exchange for their labour. To date, 136 people have signed up to the program.

Considering these opportunities for community participation, Ana remarked on a palpable feeling of ‘collective buy-in’ from many local people. Chris voiced his agreement:

“We heard directly from people that they saw tangible value in the project. It feels like it is making a real difference to their lives.”

“That’s what the carbon markets can do,” Ana added. “It’s for the climate; it’s for biodiversity and it’s for the communities,” she paused for thought. “And that almost becomes more important.”

A blue landscape picture showing the calm waters off of Karachi, Pakistan and the cloudless blue sky above.

A group of 11 people, dressed predominantly in shirts, trousers and sun hats, stand by the side of the water.

A blue, decorated boat is mored in shallow waters in Karachi, Pakistan. Two men are on board, tending to mangrove saplings ready to be planted.

Picture credit: Ana Haurie & Chris Villiers

18 April 2023

Love0

International Women’s Day: Climate solutions need female voices

By Jen StebbingNews

Evelyne Ligoberth Kapaya is a carbon champion. From her home in Katuma Village, Tanzania, she spends much of her time discussing deforestation and climate change. She sits down with local residents to raise awareness, not only of the impacts of tree felling, but also of solutions to the crisis. She is one of the many women around the world working to safeguard the future of our environment and is very much deserving of our celebration this International Women’s Day.

Every year on the 8th of March, we have an opportunity to acknowledge female achievements around the globe. However, at the same time, International Women’s Day is also a call to action. We need to better recognise women from history; we need more women in leadership positions and we urgently need more female voices, like Evelyne’s, in climate solutions.

Women are disproportionately affected by climate change

While the impacts of climate change undeniably touch the whole community, 68% of the 130 studies reviewed by Carbon Brief found that women and girls face more climate-related health risks than men and boys. Indeed, the article reports how women and girls are more likely to be adversely affected by harvest loss and are often the ones walking further to collect water during times of scarcity. Overall, the report concludes that existing gender inequalities tend to be exacerbated by changes to the climate and although women are not always experiencing the worst health outcomes of climate change, they are disproportionately affected.

Climate mitigation will be stronger with women

Given this disproportionate impact, women must be actively involved in the development and implementation of climate solutions for they have lived experience of the unique risks climate change presents for them in their area. This is especially important when the allocation of carbon revenue is decided.

Faraja Oswald Alberto works as a Finance Officer for Carbon Tanzania’s Ntakata Mountains project. Developing short and long term accounting plans with her local community, she has seen first hand how carbon finance has changed the area:

“Before the start of the Ntakata Mountains forest protection project, there was an invasion and massive clearing of forest areas. Our lands were badly damaged. After that, the community decided to make a plan for the best use of land and implemented a forest carbon project. Gradually, the environment began to improve as the community received carbon finance to support sustainable projects and forest conservation.”

This forest conservation has been supported by the growing number of female Village Game Scouts trained in Tanzania. Faraja continues:

“Village Game Scouts are now fully employed by their respective villages to protect the forests and are paid a monthly salary from the carbon credit revenue. Groups of entrepreneurs benefit from small loans made possible by carbon finance from Cocoba (Community Conservation Banks) to run their various wealth-producing activities. This is improving the local, community economy.”

Tatu Amani Mwita is a female entrepreneur who has benefitted from Cocoba finance. She owns a small restaurant in Kapanga Village which received loans from Cocoba to purchase equipment and expand the size of her restaurant. Now, Tatu employs six other women and her restaurant can run independently of loans.

Equity is essential

This year, the theme of IWD is equity. It was chosen to show how offering equal opportunities can still be exclusionary. On the face of it, an equality of resources and opportunities seems positive. Such a state is, afterall, an improvement when compared to much of the inequality we see today. However, equality does not allow for difference – everyone receives the same regardless of circumstance. Equity, on the other hand, recognises differing situations and allocates resources and opportunities accordingly. Understanding these differences is an essential first step to building, and facilitating, effective, equitable, climate solutions.

Equality-based solutions and equity-based solutions

What do these differences look like in practice? Well, equality-based solutions tend to be founded in impartiality whereas equity-based solutions consider the diverse and varying experiences of individuals and tailor solutions to account for these differences. As a result, equity-based solutions are more long-term for they address issues on a deeper level than those founded on equality. For women, this distinction is key. For instance, the women affected by climate-induced floods in California will have a radically different experience to women facing extreme flooding in Pakistan. Therefore, solutions must be context-specific if they are to be effective.

For climate, we must ensure that nature-based solutions are also equity-based solutions which actively involve and seek the participation of women. And this need not be confined to one day a year. Every day you can consciously amplify the voices of women, share their work with your networks and celebrate the achievements of your female colleagues. See our flagship portfolio projects to find out how carbon finance supports women.

Picture credit: Carbon Tanzania and Roshni Lodhi.

8 March 2023