CClimate change is a reality. The 27th Climate Summit (UNFCCC/COP) was held in Sharm el-Sheikh, with a far-reaching launch of “High Quality Blue Carbon Market Principles And Guidance”, has a new focus on nature-based solutions. The next COP is to be held in Dubai, November 2023. Whatever these important summits have achieved, human-induced climate change continues, particularly CO2 Emissions from burning massive amounts of coal, oil, and gas, with its increasing adverse impacts and climate risks related to water-, energy-, and food-security, biodiversity, and human health.
Climate change and rising sea levels are already changing many of the world’s coastal regions and affecting the living conditions of local populations. This change can occur simultaneously with increases or decreases in rainfall, resulting in huge impacts on coastal zone management, shore protection, carbon sequestration and soil organic matter accumulation. The production of food, feed, fiber, fuel and other economic purposes may be irreversibly altered.
Therefore, it is essential to monitor ongoing processes and collect reliable scientific data to find nature-based solutions for a sustainable future.
As part of the international climate debate, it is of utmost importance to find and test and implement solutions to mitigate climate change and make communities more climate resilient around the world.
It is believed that nature based solutions will play an important role. Ecosystems capable of sequestering large amounts of atmospheric and oceanic carbon are of great importance. Because of this importance, a relatively new scientific term ‘blue carbon ecosystem’ has been coined in recent times.
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Blue carbon refers to the color of marine and coastal systems, including a variety of brackish wetlands, such as, for example, semi-subhydric salt marshes, mangroves, and seagrass/seaweed beds, which are periodically or are permanently submerged by seawater, and are capable of storing large amounts of carbon in their biomass and water-logged sediments.
The term has been in use for a little over ten years, and no comprehensive definition of the term has been developed and agreed upon by the scientific community yet. Other blue carbon ecosystems may include, arguably, macro-algal reefs, kelp forests, phytoplankton, benthic communities, coastal peatland systems, coastal subkhat and deltaic reedbeds.
Complicating the overall picture even more is the fact that some of these systems may not actually act as carbon-sinks depending on topography, environmental conditions and the type and depth of the host-sediments.
To shed light on the complexity of the sequestration-capabilities of these systems, and to provide accurate scientific data, it is extremely important to differentiate these capabilities within and between ecosystems, as a mangrove forest in location A may be different from a mangrove forest in location A. space is not equal to b. To anticipate possible changes and consequences for the well-being of humanity in the wake of carbon-financing, there is an urgent need to synthesize existing scientific knowledge through international efforts.
UNESCO Chair related to scientific investigation of natural habitats, such as UNESCO Chair on Education in Biosphere Reserves for Sustainable Societies at Yokohama National University in Japan, UNESCO Chair on South-South Cooperation for Sustainable Development in Brazil, UNESCO Chair on Sustainable Development in Portugal for Biodiversity Security, Great Sandy Biosphere Reserve in Australia, with University of Tokyo, Nanjan University, Asia Climate Change Education Center in South Korea, International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO), Leibniz- Center for Marine Tropical Research and University of Bremen , The International Society for Mangrove Ecosystems (ISME), International Society for Halophyte Utilization (ISHU), Saudi ARAMCO, Urban Design Center at Yokohama (UDC-SEA), and supported by JICA and UNESCO, organized a ‘Blue Carbon Forum‘ in Yokohama in January 2023.
The Forum brought together carbon stakeholders in attendance and online, and will form a new global scientific book series to be published at Springer Nature Publishing House, called ‘Blue Carbon Ecosystems for Sustainable Development’. The first two volumes are in the making.
The Forum’s findings are intended to reach scientists, land-users, politicians, development banks, innovative farmers, investors, energy-producers and carbon-setters around the world. The findings of the Forum and the new book series will be major scientific contributions to support the implementation of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, in particular to advance blue carbon as part of climate change instruments for a better planet. Special attention will be given to UNESCO designated sites, i.e. Natural World Heritage Sites, Biosphere Reserves and Geoparks, many of which are located on islands and in coastal areas. As the problems posed by climate change and sea level rise become more significant, islands and coastal areas are among the first to face these phenomena. Biosphere reserves and other designated areas implemented by UNESCO are ideal tools to monitor these changes and develop detailed strategies to mitigate and adapt to these changes, and consequently direct implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals 2030, the Aichi Target and actions Has gone. The Lima Action Plan for Biosphere Reserves 2016-2025, as well as the recently adopted Global Biodiversity Framework.
banno boyer Natural Science Specialist of UNESCO New Delhi Office. Miguel Klusner-Gödt is visiting professor at Yokohama National University in Yokohama, Japan and former director of the UNESCO Division of Ecological and Earth Sciences.
Shahbaz Khan is the former Director of the UNESCO Regional Bureau of Science for Asia and the Pacific and currently serves as the Regional Director of the UNESCO Office in Beijing.
Hiroyuki Matsuda is a professor at Yokohama National University, past president of the East Asian Federation of Ecological Societies, and a Pew Fellow in Marine Conservation.