“A stellar example of smart and forward-looking adaptation work in action” Inger Andersen, Director of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP)
“The programme offers a triple win: for nature, communities and economies.” Yus Rusila Noor, Director of Wetlands International Indonesia
Mangroves in Indonesia
Shrimp ponds Building with Nature integrates Nature-Based Solutions with more conventional water infrastructure. On the northern coastline of Java, Indonesia’s most densely populated island, we have been restoring a coastline that has been badly damaged by people removing a green barrier of mangroves to create room for shrimp ponds. Without this protection, the sea has been invading for several decades, washing through the ponds into rice fields in the ancient regency of Demak. Former coastal villages such as Timbulsloko have become islands, connected to the shore by narrow causeways several kilometres long that must be constantly raised to keep them above water. Local communities planted new mangroves to hold back the water, but they were washed away. So we worked with them to install permeable bamboo structures along the coast, which create slack water between them and the shore, where silt accumulates, allowing mangroves to seed naturally and grow once again. We also brought in local partners to train more than 270 village shrimp farmers in how to incorporate mangroves into redesigned ponds, while adopting organic methods of aquaculture. The results have tripled pond yields. And with the revived mangroves once again acting as nurseries, local wild fish catches have improved too, benefiting both villagers and bird populations.
World Restoration Flagship Marking the World Restoration Flagship award, the director of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), Inger Andersen, called the project “a stellar example of smart and forward-looking adaptation work in action” , and a beacon for the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, which got under way in 2021. For the villagers of Demak, Building with Nature has turned the tide against an encroaching ocean. They now own the bamboo structures, and will maintain them until they become redundant as the mangroves grow and collect more silt amid their roots. Meanwhile, the village networks created by Wetlands International during the project have formed a new permanent local representative body called Bintoro (Javanese for “to manage the sea ”). “The programme offers a triple win: for nature, communities and economies,” says Yus Rusila Noor, Director of Wetlands International in Indonesia. “It meets local needs, while boosting benefits such as fisheries, carbon sequestration, recreation and biodiversity.” And it is set for expansion. “The project has created a formula that can be used in other locations,” says our Programme Head of Coasts and Deltas, Pieter van Eijk. “ Already, the Indonesian Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fisheries, a partner in the Demak project, has replicated the structures along more than 20 kilometres of vulnerable coastline in 13 districts. And we are developing similar schemes with the Ministry to help prevent flooding and erosion on the nearby islands of Lombok and Sumbawa.”
Village shrimp farmer in Demak, Building with Nature
“The project has created a formula that can be used in other locations.” Pieter van Eijk, Programme Head, Coasts and Deltas of Wetlands International
Wetlands International Annual Review 2022
Wetlands International Annual Review 2022
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