WRI Land Accelerator Grant
Exploring Mangrove Restoration in Maharashtra
January 2024
In November 2021, Technology for Wildlife (TfW) and EcoNiche presented the Reimagining Coasts Initiative (RCI) to the World Resource Institute’s (WRI) Land Accelerator Grant. The mission of RCI is to accelerate and enhance mangrove conservation along India’s coastline. Mangroves, which thrive in the challenging conditions between land and sea, are well adapted to saline, waterlogged, and anaerobic environments. Their role as carbon sinks makes them a powerful nature-based solution (NbS) in the fight against climate change. We were among the top 3% of nearly 500 applicants and successfully secured the innovation grant, enabling us to explore mangrove conservation opportunities on community and private lands in Maharashtra, in collaboration with Farmers for Forests (F4F).
In May 2022, the TfW and F4F teams visited Raigad to meet with community partners and explore strategies to enhance the protection, management, and governance of existing mangrove patches, as well as to restore mangroves on suitable privately-owned and community lands.
The villages we visited along the Savitri River are located 30 to 50 km from the Arabian Sea. As land erosion and subsidence increase, and as freshwater exploitation and rising sea levels cause saline water to encroach further inland, the freshwater rivers of India are becoming increasingly saline. In this region, it has been common practice to build bunds to prevent saline backflow into coastal agricultural fields. The community's efforts to construct and maintain these bunds have enabled agriculture to flourish in the area. However, these bunds have recently collapsed due to a lack of financial resources and maintenance, driven by low political interest and the migration of younger generations to urban areas in search of economic security. During our visit, we observed that the village populations primarily consisted of senior citizens. Meanwhile, the increasing salinization of agricultural lands has created favorable conditions for mangrove growth, which led us to these sites.
Our visit, accompanied by EcoNiche Advisor and mangrove expert Dr. V. Selvam, began with discussions with landowners and village sarpanches, who had previously engaged with F4F. F4F has been working in the region through a highly successful Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) model, starting with dialogues with landowners interested in plantations and soil restoration on their lands. Our goal was to support F4F in assessing the suitability of lands they had identified for mangrove plantations and in designing and planning restoration strategies.
As we walked through the villages, we listened to stories of both reward and heartbreak, as agricultural lands have fluctuated in productivity due to increasingly unpredictable environmental and climatic conditions. We gathered historical information on land use, the presence of mangroves, and the threats they face at these sites. We identified key channels, breaks in bunds, tidal inundation patterns, and the overall health of the ecosystem. Additionally, we conducted photo-documentation of the existing mangroves and associated species.
TfW utilized their Uncrewed Aerial Vehicle (UAV) to conduct aerial surveys of potential mangrove restoration sites. The high-resolution imagery captured during these surveys facilitated discussions with landowners about integrating their land into F4F’s initiatives. This approach significantly reduced the time and effort required compared to traditional ground surveys. Moreover, relying on satellite imagery or land-based maps alone could have compromised the precision and clarity necessary for informed decision-making.
Over the next few months we heard of High Court of Bombay had ruled that any mangroves growing on private lands would be brought under the jurisdiction of the Maharashtra Forest Department and associated Mangrove Cell. As such, many landowners were reluctant to actively restore mangroves on their land and we could not further pursue the initiative. Nonetheless, we learned a lot, particularly how remote sensing technology can ease the ways in which we identify and select land suitable for mangrove restoration, monitor mangrove ecosystem health, and present data and information to communities. This presents a huge opportunity for meaningful partnerships that can facilitate the planning, design and deployment of nature-based solutions in general.
For more information see TfW blog on Mudflats to Mangroves.
[*all photos are by Technology for Wildlife (TfW)]
by Nisha DSouza