Mangroves cover only about 147,000 km² of the planet, an area roughly the size of Bangladesh. Yet these coastal forests store enormous amounts of carbon, shield millions of people from storms and flooding, and act as nurseries for the fish that coastal communities depend on. Because there is so little of them, every hectare counts.
That is the central argument of a new open-access paper, Ambitious goals for global mangrove conservation and restoration, published on October 27 in the journal Ambio. The paper was led by the Global Mangrove Alliance (GMA), a network of more than 100 civil society and academic organizations in 30 countries, and brings together scientists and practitioners from around the world. Seatrees is proud to have contributed: our own Orion McCarthy is a co-author.
Why generic targets aren't enough
Under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, countries have committed to protecting 30% of land and sea and restoring 30% of degraded ecosystems by 2030. Those are important goals, but the authors point out that mangroves passed the 30% protection mark more than a decade ago. For an ecosystem this valuable and this limited, "30%" risks becoming a ceiling rather than a floor. Allowing continued losses would come at a heavy cost to both nature and people.
So the GMA set a higher bar. By 2030, its three goals are to:
- Halt loss: reduce mangrove losses driven by direct human actions to zero.
- Restore half: restore mangroves across at least half of all recently lost area.
- Double protection: secure long-term protection of mangroves, doubling it where feasible, with a minimum of 30% in every country.
What hitting the goals would mean
Using global data from Global Mangrove Watch, the authors put numbers on each goal for the first time:
- Halting loss would prevent roughly 1,500 km² of mangroves from disappearing this decade, keeping about 27 million tonnes of carbon locked in place. Four countries (Indonesia, Myanmar, Mexico and Malaysia) account for half of recent human-driven losses.
- Restoring half means bringing back about 4,000 km² of the roughly 7,900 km² of former mangrove area that is still realistic to restore. That secures around 71 million tonnes of carbon remaining in those soils, with another 23 million tonnes captured over time as the forests regrow.
- Doubling protection would add about 36,000 km² of mangroves under effective, equitable protection, bringing the global total to roughly two-thirds of all mangroves (today it's about 40%).
The benefits go well beyond carbon. An estimated 4.1 million small-scale fishers rely on mangrove-associated fisheries, and mangroves support the yearly recruitment of more than 700 billion young fish and invertebrates. Other research cited in the paper finds that mangroves reduce flood risk for 15 million people and over US$65 billion in property worldwide.
Doing restoration right
The paper is clear that hectares alone aren't the measure of success. Hastily planned projects, especially mass plantings of one or two species in the wrong places, often fail. Effective restoration has to be grounded in local hydrology and ecology, secure land tenure, and above all the engagement and leadership of the communities who live alongside mangroves. Protection, likewise, has to be effective and equitable, not just lines on a map.
That principle sits at the heart of how Seatrees works. In Marereni, on the coast of Kilifi County, Kenya, we partner with COBEC (Community Based Environmental Conservation), a grassroots organization founded in 2005, to restore more than 640 hectares of degraded mangrove forest. Since 2022, the project has planted more than one million mangroves and created 600+ local jobs, 40% of them held by women. Trained community scouts patrol the forests alongside the Kenya Forest Service, and the project's TREEDUCATION Fund provides scholarships for local students. In a 2024 survey of 383 households, 91% of residents reported positive changes in their local ecosystem, and three-quarters of planters said their food security and access to healthcare had improved. Learn more about the Marereni project.
The road to 2030
The goals are ambitious, but the authors argue they are realistic and measurable. They have already been adopted as part of the UN Climate Champions' Mangrove Breakthrough, which estimates that around US$4 billion in investment is needed to reach them by 2030. Closing that gap will take governments, funders, businesses and individuals working together, and civil society groups like the GMA are well placed to connect global ambition with action on the ground.
[Optional quote from Orion on why this paper matters / what contributing to it meant for Seatrees.]