Protecting Mangroves, Guardians of the Coasts and Planet

The first segment on Mangroves focused on the vital role of mangroves, why they’re often overlooked, and the main contributing factors jeopardizing this ecosystem. In Part II, Jorden and Kimberly discuss who’s working to protect—and in some cases revitalize mangroves, by delving into the challenges that abound in protecting Blue Carbon zones. To succeed, corporate and grassroots sustainability initiatives need to be bolstered by robust intergovernmental standards.

Key Topics Jorden and Kimberly discuss include:

• Why mangroves should be featured on every NGO’s annual freebie calendar

• Whether carbon trading is a valuable market instrument or just enables more polluting

• Why the UN’s Food & Agriculture Organization (FAO) has a huge stake in mangrove conservation

• Indonesia’s realization that 8 million acres of mangroves is worth a lot more alive than deforested

• Why corporations are investing in mangrove conservation—and it’s not just for a philanthropy tax write-off

• Which came first: The Blue Man Group or the Blue Carbon Group?

Recommended Resources

• All things carbon trading and mangroves

• From the Blue Carbon Group to Global Mangrove Alliance to the Mangrove Action Project, plenty of NGOs work to conserve and educate

• Just how endowed Indonesia is with mangroves and what they’re doing about it

• Kimberly’s Substack newsletter post

They're not sexy, but mangroves are miracle-workers

Episode Transcript

KIMBERLY

Welcome to part two of mangroves, our celebratory one -year anniversary episode of Sustainable Planet. I'm political scientist Kimberly Weir and my co -host is Jordan Dye, a guy who knows an awful lot about sustainability issues. In part one, we talked about why mangroves are an amazing and vital ecosystem, but they're in jeopardy. In addition to losing these carbon sinkholes, mangrove deforestation increases coastal erosion and pollution globally. threatening the plants, animals, and humans who are dependent on them. So Jordan, who's working to save the mangroves?

JORDEN

You know, as usual, the usual suspects are working at it. But I think in this way, it's really the NGOs that are leading the efforts on this. I think as we'll get into, for reasons government efforts and corporate efforts are really stalled out along economic lines. And the really exciting work's happening in that NGO space.

KIMBERLY

For sure. I agree with you. This is the sort of thing that NGOs like thrive on and live for, right? Helping people and the planet. And this is where we definitely see evidence of that. There are so many different groups. I had an interesting experience when I was in Madagascar. I met volunteers from an NGO. It was just a small NGO. I can't remember the name of it. But they were there actually replanting mangrove trees. And it was a really cool thing that they were doing. And I actually wanted to stop off and just help them because they're like, this is such an important thing you're doing. Thank you. And I should have pictures of that. So I'll try to make that the picture for this episode if I can find those. Yeah. And so we do. There are lots. Probably one of the most prominent is the Global Mangrove Alliance. It was one of the biggest ones. Early on, the World Wildlife Fund, I like to think of as the original and still authentic WWF for people who are, I guess maybe that might not even be a thing people know about anymore, right? Is that the world wrestling entertainment complex now, I don't even know what they're called anymore, but they were, they tried to be WWF and they lost out the battle to World Wildlife Fund that had started in 1960. That's why we have the WWE,

JORDEN

why we have the WWE, right? Yes,

KIMBERLY

Yes, this one is still called E. Okay, I thought so. So the WWF, they have the mangroves for community and climate. And what they realized very early on in their campaign was it was one thing to try to save the wildlife, but unless they had investments in the local communities, it didn't matter how much they threw at conservation efforts. They had to have buy -in from the locals because if they were being shortchanged, they were going to continue poaching. They were going to continue. deforesting and whatever it was because they needed those resources. And why should they care what people halfway around the world thought about what was going on in their community if they didn't have an investment in those actual people? People care more about elephants than they do about humans.

JORDEN

No, exactly. And I think that this really drives the best way to approach these, especially as somebody who works in the non -governmental area when working with local communities. You need to start from a place of empathy and understanding that they're actually making the most rational and best decision that they can. And so if you start from that place, especially on mangroves, you can understand that, OK, we need to replace the income. We need to replace the benefit that they're getting from taking this ecosystem. Otherwise, it is just a form of moralism, in my opinion, of going and telling do better without and starting from that place of no, they're actually doing the thing that makes the most sense. And we need to shift that calculus and help.

KIMBERLY

I think, too, not even just replacing, but giving them even a bit more because then they say, well, I can continue to poach and then I can get this extra money on the side. But having that in such a set up in such a way that it's absolutely important and you are getting much more of a benefit by having this investment. I think that that really helps. Right. I was just going to say, too, one of my other favorites is the Blue Carbon Group, because, you know, you know, I don't know if I'm. Perhaps it came before Blue Man Group or maybe Blue Man Group was inspired by Blue Carbon Group. I don't know. But that's another big one that's out there. And I think that that's important because that really that their name in and of itself, like, like, first of all, maybe I don't know if it works their benefit or not. Right. Because on the one hand, it's like, well, it draws attention to blue carbon because they're helping with mangroves. It also shows that it's more than just like, you know, save the manatees is more than just save the manatee, right? You can adopt a manatee. Well, you can have dropped a mangrove tree, but you're saving a lot more than just that. It requires a lot more, as we talked about in part one. But with Blue Carbon Group, like maybe it's lost on people. People just don't even know to make that association unless they bother to delve into it.

JORDEN

No, I think it's really important also to to separate from other. carbon you know market activities right and so because so much of them is focused on you know in the natural processes sphere on forest reforestation right and and typically for the most part in global north countries I think that going to blue carbon and really anchors that this is a concern of the oceanic regions and the coastal regions of the globe, particularly in that tropical and subtropical region. And so, A, it allows people that that's their area of interest to focus on it. But I think it drives that there are distinctions. And then you can get to the point that we made in the last episode of how much more carbon is stored this way. Right. So it's also a differentiator and then allows it to elevate itself in relation to, I think, some of the other natural. And so great idea from, you know, from the group.

KIMBERLY

Yeah. And I hope they get the attention that's that's deserved of them because of that. And and I think you make sort of an important point. I'm not sure how much you really hit on it when you were just talking to bring home the point that that. We need to reduce carbon dioxide emissions full stop. And here's a really big part, big, important chunk of how we can really help to do that. That's not trying to, you know, recapture or draw it from the atmosphere or whatever. I mean, like this is something that all we need to do is protect what's already there. And it's already working way better for us than anything else.

JORDEN

I think that, you know, in the same way. So when I talk to corporations about climate issues, it's always. basically emission reductions first then offsets right and then alternatives so it's kind of that's the the latter you should be reducing that absolute amount And I think that it's similar here. Our first step on any of this should be enhancing the net and saving the natural processes already doing it. We will need to do engineered solutions and find ways on top of it because of the system we've created. That's fine. But the more we can do to protect what the Earth does so well starts us off at a better baseline and means, as your point, the changes that we need to make. A, have to be less drastic and less rapid. So great point, Kimberly.

KIMBERLY

And I think if we go back to the, we did a whole episode on Amazon, basically with subscribe and save. And that's one of the things that Amazon is actually doing here. They created the right now climate fund. And just, you know, we're not proponents for Amazon necessarily or anything. And we're certainly not being endorsed or paid by them. But that's something that... As you just mentioned, that having a corporation recognize, hey, we need to offset, we need to figure out, we need an action plan, we need to figure out a way that we can reduce our carbon footprint. And by creating right now a climate fund, here's a way to support sustainability operations. They have one in India. So Amazon India is investing $1 .2 million over three years in mangrove restoration. They have one that's the Amazon Netherlands that established a seaweed farm for carbon capture and storage. And that's something that's really interesting with the Netherlands is to what's going on because they don't have mangroves, but they got huge coastlines and they've got definitely absolutely have concerns about. I mean, one is one of the three low lying countries, right? When the Benelux countries, some of it's actually like Rotterdam is one third of Rotterdam's underwater. And so these are things that are real concerns for them. And so having the seaweed farms for carbon capture and storage, and then the added bonus of having that be that barrier and help to do basically what a mangrove does in other parts of the world, like that's great stuff. And so there are companies, corporations that have, you know, they're investing in this front end. I don't even know if it's a front end. Like they're investing in this aspect of it, which is a lot easier than some of the other stuff that they could do that would be much more costly.

JORDEN

No, exactly. And it gets to our point of protecting those ecosystem services that are driving benefits. And I think that's a great tie in that even in the Netherlands, you know, going back to the last episode, my example of what got me on this topic with just, oh, build the dykes. When you look at the Netherlands have the most extensive and honestly amazing dike system in the world. The country wouldn't exist without it. But even they are reaching their limits of engineering or their limits of cost benefit on that and are now even themselves turning back to, hey, what are some of the natural ways we can do this to limit what we have to do on the human side? And I think that just right there drives that the natural systems are the important ones we should be focusing on.

KIMBERLY

Yeah. And when it comes to corporations, you know, like a lot of times, so one of the biggest obvious things that most people are probably familiar with is just the carbon market, right? The buying and selling off of carbon offsets, carbon, it goes by so many different names and often confusing for people because it's carbon pricing, carbon trading, cap and trade. We had a whole episode on cap and trade if you missed that. So, you know, we actually go into that quite in depth earlier. Go back to that episode. But it's, you know, like it's a very controversial sort of approach to dealing with this environmental issue, because on the one hand, it can be really a great thing. But oftentimes, on the other hand, it's abused. And that's why it's less of a great thing. So what are your thoughts on on the carbon market?

JORDEN

Well, this is most of my work is all around carbon markets, both in compliance markets and then what we would call voluntary markets. A lot of my actual day job revolves around renewable energy credits and looking at carbon markets around renewable energy, but also more recently into carbon removals and carbon removal markets. I think you basically laid out the summary. Great. There can be great advantages of them and as a great mechanism for rewarding or financing activities. And then we have a lot of examples of how they've been used negatively. And in recent years, actually, a lot of. What I would say are questionable or just outright bad practices between 2010 and 2020 have really led to be a pullback from corporations, because one of the bad things here is no company wants to be accused of greenwashing, even if they're a company that is greenwashing. Right. Like that's you don't want to be accused of it. And then for a lot of companies. I work with a lot of sustainability offices and I always say whatever issue I'm talking to you about is not your core competency. Your business is great at selling something or making something. And now you're turning your attention to try to do this. So carbon markets for a long time offered companies what they thought was a way of giving money and funneling it to the experts and the projects that were doing the work. And then so you look at some of the backlash and especially in nature based offsets in forests. a lot of over -counting, or my personal biggest issue with them is a lot of the forest fires that have ripped through carbon market forests. No company that I'm aware of, and if any listener can correct me on this, I would love it, but no company's taken those emissions back on their books, which would be the true morally right and just accounting right way of doing it, right? So I think that at a high level, you really have to look at how that specific carbon market is set up. and how they are regulated. Now, in the case of these markets that we're talking about here, most of them are actually voluntary markets. So, you know, Amazon, when they're purchasing, you know, blue carbon credits, it's not typically not from a regulated entity. Now, they are monitored and there are international standards. The Greenhouse Gas Protocol is one of the leading organizations that actually sets the standards for these. So there are ways to make sure you're getting high quality credits. Again, this is done in the voluntary market. And from my perspective, I do like this. It drives money to the issue. It gives away a company of quantifying it. And at the end of the day, I don't think that every single company should be trying to build their own one -off program. It's not going to lead to the mass benefits, and it's not going to funnel the money to where we can have the most impact. So I think carbon markets offer, if done right, a nice way of doing that. I'm sorry for my rant on carbon.

KIMBERLY

No, I think it makes me think it's the same sort of issue that plagues the cocoa industry because it's a voluntary protocol, basically, where it's up to the top seven companies, chocolatiers in the world to put this together, fund it and so forth. Some companies along the way, their answer has been, well, we just have our own project that we're doing here. And like Cadbury, for one example, that's changed names 17 times since then, but sorry.

KIMBERLY

But with Cadbury, they wanted to, they had a very... specific flavor for their dairy milk chocolate. And they wanted to preserve that community in a sustainable way to make sure that they had that same quality control of the flavor, consistent flavor of the chocolate. But then they use that as the excuse of why they're not going to pay more into the protocol to protect more of the cocoa industry worldwide, right? And so it's basically, you know, when we go back to carbon, it's this polluter pays model where Basically, we're in a capitalist system. So of course, this is how businesses are going to look at this and they're going to approach it from. And it's based on free market supply and demand. If there is a demand for these permits, somebody is going to supply them. And so they can be really good in the ways that you described. And the ones that then tend to get the negative publicity are the, well, so -and -so was buying carbon permits in a forest that was already really protected or under state protection or something anyway, or some conservation group had already been doing the work. And they're not really contributing anything to this. And so without international laws in place, like the COCO protocol, right, along those lines, without having something international law that have repercussions, when it's just voluntary, then you're not going to have that same sort of meaningful impact and the repercussions if you don't follow the rules.

JORDEN

No, it's such a great point. And I mean, even in the designs of these, there's trade -offs we run into when designing carbon markets all the time. And in a lot of ways, if you follow out the design of any carbon market, it doesn't always make sense. So a great way is, you know, renewable energy, right? So just as a quick example. When you're calculating your emissions from, you know, energy, you use the grid factor for where you're pulling your energy. And then if you buy a bunch of renewable energy and it has to be additional. So you got to the point of they're often buying old things or this can happen. And that gets to in all carbon markets, you need to look for additionality. It's whether it's in mangroves, blue carbon forest. It has to be above the natural rate right now. So the company, sorry, my example here, when the company buys a lot of renewable energy, they're taking that amount off and saying that they reduced that amount, but it actually reduces for the whole grid. So there's a little bit of double counting there. Now, the tension is, is if you don't allow for that double counting, there's no incentive to make the investment. So you get less renewables on average. But it would be more technically right. And so in all of these systems, there's this trade off between going for the perfect system that reflects reality and creating a system that will actually drive that investment. So you get to reap the benefits. And I think that's at the core of a lot of the tensions around these systems.

KIMBERLY

Well, and when you were talking about those that have that forest that were now, you know, victims of forest fires, the first thought that came to my head was, okay, so not only are they possibly still having these on the books as something that's, you know, carbon permit trade -off offset, but what about all those emissions that were released then because of the forest fires? They're certainly not counting those. So they talk about double counting. This is like double counting in the negative, right? Taking credit for something. That doesn't even exist anymore and not even taking basically accounting for all of the pollution that was released as a result of this.

JORDEN

No, exactly. And which is why I lead with it as my critique of carbon systems, because I think that I want I want carbon systems to be a big part of how we fight climate change, because at the end of the day, I think it's the best way to drive corporate action. And we've talked about on so many episodes, that system is what's driving yours and my end harm. But I think that you have to acknowledge the ways they failed because we need to. And this is what's really going on right now. This is a maybe a really interesting broader discussion. There's a lot of changes going on in carbon markets and how these things are counted. And even the voluntary standards, because they've they've seen that lack of trust and they're trying to ramp it up. And it's also one of the areas going back to why I think blue carbon is really smart and separating itself out from because it actually keeps it away from some of the issues we've seen in other aspects of carbon markets.

KIMBERLY

Well, I think that at a time with just the global political climate of retraction from commitments to everything, when we talk about corporations backing away from ESG funds and also then moving to international organizations, just losing their funding flat out, losing one of the biggest supporters for some of these projects and mandates, whatever, to try to reduce climate change and commitments to the environment. Like these are places that are taking big hits. And so trying to rely on intergovernmental organizations like the UN Environment Program. Okay. So they've got the REDD program. That's the horrible, right? Reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation. Okay. REDD program. Just stick with that and you'll know. Which is also, you think that's also weird because it's REDD and you're trying to describe something that's blue and, you know, whatever. I just had a problem with their acronym and their name. But the point is, is to try to give countries financial incentives to reduce deforestation and conserve mangroves. And that's a great thing. But we're talking about. The 121 countries needing that funding for mangroves, which is one small thing in a big giant pod of a whole bunch of different environmental issues that are going on. And, you know, a lot of people don't even really think about for the UNEP to even be effective. They also have to worry about what's going on in the ground with the locals because they need to help preserve quality of life for people. because they're not going to be able to conserve the environment if the people's needs aren't being met. So then they necessarily have to coordinate with others, and they're all fighting for that same pot. And then, you know, we have also... With the with the U .N. FCCCC, et cetera. Also, like I'll just call it climate change and be done with it already.

JORDEN

Another U.N. program.

KIMBERLY

Yes. We'll just go with that. Right. We've got the mangrove breakthrough, which was, you know, great because it's a multi -stakeholder initiative to try to billions of dollars to protect lots of mangroves by, you know, really short time, 2030. But they have some projects that they're working on. But if you're actually going to and we're actually going to rely, try to rely on them to save the day is just not happening.

JORDEN

No, 100 percent. And I think there's two big things here. One, so like we talked about in the first episode that, you know, 62 percent of mangrove losses over the last 20 years were driven by land use change. 80 percent of those losses were concentrated in only six Southeast Asian countries. And that I think and it's all driven by economic reasons there and the domestic forestation. So really, while we're talking about doing this everywhere, actually, for these intergovernmental agencies to put pressure on six countries that have clearly made the economic choice in their in their kind of setup, that it's worth the destruction gets really hard because you're fighting against billions in entrenched interest and entrenched value.

KIMBERLY

But Jordan, what we're talking about here is the fact that that. These countries are lauded for their mass economic growth and development. They're not chastised because, oh, you destroyed some mangroves along the way and, oh, your conservation effort's been kind of crappy. No, they're being like, oh, held up as Asian tigers and all of these Southeast Asian wonder stories because of this. And so it's not just those countries that are being, you know, they are not just rewarding this in and of themselves. They are being rewarded by others for this. And yes. This is where if you're the one in the government and you have to make this decision, are you going to go for the economic development and say, oh, we'll try to deal with these environmental issues now that people are in a better situation? You can't really blame governments and developing countries for doing this because one, global North countries did this already in a way worse, way, way, way more destructive way.

JORDEN

If I ever get to my retirement and have time to sit down and finally write a book on sustainability, the one I'd write, the name I've always had in my brain is Burning Our Roots. Because I think that everything, and you just said it, our system was built by burning the actual, that unseen foundation that allows for prosperity. And we're repeating it again in the developing world. And I think that that's the... The image in my mind, right? You see the forest growing and you think everything's good and you're seeing and you're lauding these countries for their massive growth. And look how great it is without realizing that below that ground, they're burning away the entire thing that that allows for the long term. So that's a great analogy.

KIMBERLY

a great analogy. I hope that you retire soon so I can read this.

JORDEN

I did want to stop on the mangrove breakthrough because they're connected to the Global Mangrove Alliance. And I actually I think a lot of times and this is as one who works in organizations like this, sometimes when you hear our goals. You're like, well, OK, you're not going to do that. You know, it's just it almost seems like you set up to fail because of how and they're needed. They're always connected to a scientific outcome. And but you just it's not going to happen. And I really liked the mangrove breakthroughs goals. Now, the 2030 timeline, again, and we're talking five years from now with most of the investment decisions needed in the next two or three to see that. But the goals, I think, are measured and reasonable. So the first goal is halt global losses from humans. And again, 62 % of that driven and it's all within our control is their point, right? We are the ones actively doing it. We can stop that. Restore half of the losses. Now, this one's actually was really interesting to me because of the 11 ,000 square kilometers, I'm sorry, that have been lost over the last two decades, 8 ,000 square kilometers are still categorized as able to be restored or saved. So a large majority of what we've lost in the most recent years, we could save again. And I think that's so they're not even going that they're talking about half of the losses, right? Now, and then their final goal is doubling protection. It was really interesting for me to find that 40 % of global mangroves are currently under protected area status. And their goal by 2030 is to have that hit 80%. Now, as listeners might guess by how we've been talking about the concentration of mangroves in four countries and concentration of loss in six, that next 40 % is going to be harder than the first 40 % by an order of magnitude.

KIMBERLY

I think one more organization I think that's worth noting is that the Food and Agriculture Organization, that it's under the UN also. So we're talking about yet another UN way to try to that it's kind of all of this stuff ends up being dumped on the UN. OK, you deal with this issue, right? But the fact that that the FAO is really important and integral to saving mangroves because. It's tied directly to the agriculture that's causing the desforestation and the fishing and the fisheries and where these nutrients are coming from and why it's important to have these for local people because most of these occur in developing countries. And so depleting these, you know, so the FAO has a vested interest also, even though it might seem like so far removed, a very vested interest in protecting these mangroves too. I think going back to, oh, do you want to? I just sort of railroaded on, you know, how I can be. But so this made me think of Indonesia, right? Because Indonesia. is an island chain. It has over 8 million acres of mangroves. It is the biggest. It's got more mangrove concentration than any other country in the world. And this is even after, these statistics are from 2025, February of this year. And so, yeah. And so this is even after years of rapid forest deforestation due to the logging and the farming, the date palm oil planting and the monocropping that we talked about in part one. that it's also, you know, as the world's biggest supplier of palm oil, along with neighboring Malaysia, also another rich, you know, mangrove -rich country, this is still, in fact, the largest area of mangroves in the world. It's estimated to be 20 to 25 % of the whole entire globe is concentrated right there. And scientists estimate that Indonesia's coastlines store more than 3 billion tons of carbon dioxide. And this is, you know, so this is just the story. This does not even include all of the sucking in that it's doing on top of that and all of the other externality, great externality contributions, right? We talk of externalities as this thing that is always dismissed, but in, you know, mangroves, man, they've got externalities covered in spades, right? Because you've got the filtration and the stopping the coastal erosion and stopping the pollution and all of these things that they do, storm protections and barriers and so forth. And so that on top of the fact that they're storing it, also sucking in more carbon dioxide. And so they want to, they actually want to increase their carbon trading. And this goes back to, so this connects us to what they're doing in conjunction with the World Bank, which values these at $50 ,000 for every two and a half acres. So there is a real economic incentive to conserve and restore lost mangroves, but they're expensive to replenish. So the one thing, and this goes to what you were saying, half of Indonesia's mangroves are considered of high quality, that they have minimal to no degradation. And that's great. But when we're looking at the 20 to 25 % of the world's mangroves, and then you take half of that and you say, okay, the other half then means that you need to re -up these, replenish them, do something. And it's a costly venture to do this. And so it's worth it, certainly worth the investment. And the forestry, a forestry study was done that estimates that they can generate up to $8 ,000 for every one and two and a half acres. So every hectare. $8 ,000 they can generate every single year from fishing alone. That's not even all of the added benefits, right? So now the Indonesian government is looking at this and saying, hey, we have a real vested interest, economic interest as an already emerging economy that's on the higher level of higher end of development to really try to turn some resources toward this and do even more carbon offset trading.

JORDEN

No, and it's really a great example of trying to drive that benefit. I'm still stuck a little bit in my brain on the 3 billion tons stored. Up in Canada, we think of the permafrost as a carbon bomb, right? That's at start. And I don't think anybody's ever actually... At least I haven't heard somebody describe the mangrove forest as another, you know, unwitting carbon bomb that's sitting there. And I think that what you see there in Indonesia is really tying it into that economic, their broader economy and like a national government looking at it in a broad way, right? One of the, it's interesting that so much of their mangroves are still, you know, in good condition. One of preparing for this episode, I found two interesting graphs that I'll send you so you can have in. is the IUCN's Drivers of Mangroves Lost map. So you can see whether the area is facing loss from primarily human or nature, and it's different around the globe. But then also NASA did a global study with imagery of areas of so endangered or healthy mangroves. And if you overlay them, the areas with natural loss as the primary driver are the areas that are still are healthy mangroves. And the areas of human driver loss are all the critical areas. So you can rate, see and understand probably thinking of Indonesia. And, you know, again, our sand episode comes up a few times in our last in these two. But the disappearing island chains. Right. So you can see where they're driving that is probably going to be kind of the critical areas and areas that have not been touched yet are probably driving it. Just an interesting connection there.

KIMBERLY

Well, and this is something that, too, for the United States government, the NOAA. Right. We talk about NOAA a lot on the show. It has a coastal blue carbon, a whole service that they do. And we're talking about a country that has very few mangroves, right, in the United States. And so, but here's something that still there's, you know, the National Oceanic, help me out here, National Oceanic Atmospheric Association of America, I don't know. It's like so many acronyms in the world that. that one of the things they're doing then is, you know, recognizing how important blue carbon mangroves and so forth are and trying to do something to that end, even though just a tiny fraction in the United States alone.

JORDEN

Well, and I think that, you know, one joke on the acronyms for listeners, I know my friend of mine, my cause manager is always cringing when we just say the name. Well, I think there are so many acronyms in this space, and I don't know the last time I actually said NOAA out. It's been a decade or more of just NOAA in the space. No, but this gets to the... problem of who's paying for it right who has to incentivize that because it is an externality and even though you know ecological economists with biodiversity researchers and biologists can go in and show and categorize and say here's what you're getting to your point unless they in earlier unless those communities or the government can actually see a monetary benefit in their account from it It's not going to matter more than a number on a spreadsheet. So the problem is and that's why, you know, going back to carbon markets as a way of really driving value and incentivizing those payments. Well,

KIMBERLY

that's the thing is that everything in the capitalist system has to be quantifiable. And these are ways to quantify the contributions of the environment and the costs of losing these things in the environment. But if you can especially focus on what the contributions are and the potential gains from this, then hopefully more there will be more entrepreneurial enterprises around that. Because if we're going to just rely on intergovernmental organizations to do this or, you know, the extent to which NGOs get. any decent amount of funding and volunteers and everything that they use to operate. It's got to be that combination of corporations and countries trying to find ways to, I keep using the word incentivize, I kind of hate it, but that's exactly what it is.

JORDEN

I always make the joke that capitalism is a great and horrible system at the same time because it's all about the alignment of incentives. And if incentives are aligned to negative outcomes, we will produce negative outcomes from here to the end of time. If incentives can be shift to produce good outcomes in an intentional way, the system will just produce good outcomes till the end of time and overdo it there, right? There is no motivation behind it other than just what are we getting paid for?

KIMBERLY

I can't blame the capitalist system. The capitalist system is just this thing that is based on supply and demand and wants and needs and, you know, responses, you know, responding to the market. The market responds to, you know. And that's it.

JORDEN

And that's it. And it can produce a horrible outcome if we allow it or it can produce great outcomes. And so I always, whenever I hear critiques of capitalism, I always laugh. I'm like, well, it's a critique of society, actually, is what you're saying. But this gets to the second thing. We talk about carbon markets. There's one more that has me excited for multinational corporations. And it was the 2023 release from the Task Force on Nature -Related Disclosures. So this followed up in 2017, the first Task Force on Climate -Related Disclosures released, which led to the largest increase in actual reporting and measuring of corporate carbon impacts. Because for the first time, it was really laid out for all companies to see how... GHG emissions were a fiduciary risk to their shareholders. And it put it completely in the most, I mean, climate activists and some of my more, you know, I'd say leftist friends were like, this isn't climate change. What are you talking about? You're talking about risk and impacts. And but I was like, that's what corporations think in. That's what they need to see. And from my perspective, working in the field like that release in 2017 changed the game. and allowed companies to both talk with their boards, talk with their shareholders and process it in a way they understood. And it led to, in my mind, awareness is the first step, understanding the problem. And so having companies being releasing this information. So in 2023. nature -related disclosures were finally released. And so I'm hoping that as the next kind of decade goes on, we see this exact same ramp up in disclosures on mangroves, disclosures on forests, disclosures on the actual physical impacts, because that'll then allow us to start putting pressure and coming up with solutions for the companies and industries that are really driving it. So it's not a thing that'll incentivize profit or a financial incentive, but it puts that pressure on so that we can even name the problem.

KIMBERLY

Yeah, it's like putting it into a translating into a language that they understand, right? That's what it's really about in this instance. So this seems like you're kind of hopeful in this regard that here we have something that actually can really give a reason for businesses to get on board with protecting mangroves, as we're talking about and dealing with carbon offsets and carbon emissions, you know. Do you have other reasons why you're hopeful about this? Or is it just like another one of the episodes we get to the end and we're both like, well.

JORDEN

So this one's really funny for me because I've known the entire time we were discussing this that I am hopeful. But even as we're talking, there was multiple times where I was thinking that if I was listening to the episode, I wouldn't know how Jordan was going to get to hope by the end of it. And so my hope on this is a wrong two categories. First is where we're at gives me hope and then incentives for the future. So starting with where we're at, and I think that is, you know, pulling it back for a second, right? The rate of destruction is shrinking. So, you know, for everybody living through inflation the last few years, yes, inflation high, but rate going down is still a good thing, right? And that's one of the big hopes for me is that the rate of destruction is shrinking. And even if we cut it in half from almost 1 % annual loss to half a percent annual loss, doubles the time that we have to deal with this, right? So I think massive change there. Second was that ability to recover damaged ecosystems. Right. The fact that 69 percent of the last of the loss in the last 20 years is able to be restored is something that gives me a lot of hope because saving and restoring mangroves is possible. Replacing mangroves isn't because once that system to hold that sediment in and anchor that ecosystem is fully lost, you can't basically because of how erosion works, you're not going to be able to put plants back. So that that gives me hope. And then as you. Kind of hit on a lot awareness around this issue. Really, again, 42 % of global mangroves are covered. I think as more and more countries have an awareness of the economic and ecosystem impacts, I think we will see that grow. Now, on the second side, it's kind of where we're going and the incentives. And we talked about them here, right? The carbon markets and the sophistication of mechanisms to flow funds for those benefits, as well as my kind of future look at the disclosure and being able to name and point to. Again, no company wants to be the worst, at least not publicly. So the second that we can say, oh, wow, you are the world's worst company for mangroves. I guarantee you will see that company investing money in the next two years to not be the world's worst. Right. So that is what's driving my hope that this might not reach the point of some of the other issues that it's a tipping point. And then you look at coral, coral, excuse me, coral, coral reefs. Wow. It's my turn to have a rental tongue today.

KIMBERLY

It's my turn

JORDEN

No, when you look at coral reefs, in some ways, we're at a tipping point where they're almost guaranteed that past 2100, they will be destroyed. We're not there with mangroves. And I hope that we never hit that point.

KIMBERLY

And the coral reefs actually have a better chance of hope if the mangroves are doing better also. So another reason, if you like coral reefs and you like, you know, diving and so forth, here's a good reason to care about mangroves. Something you've never really heard about. Yeah.

JORDEN

you've never really

KIMBERLY

Well, I also like you, I feel like. When I actually really started looking at the numbers for these things, you know, that the situation and scenario isn't just already a foregone conclusion. So I think in that regard, and the fact that they have mangroves have gotten far more attention in the last decade as people realize how important they are. And also because of the blue carbon aspect of that, and there's just so much more concern and attention to. How do we capture carbon dioxide and how do we offset that? I think that even if the average individual isn't hearing about this, businesses are far more, anyone, corporations are far more sort of in, you know, in tune with this. I always,

KIMBERLY

I don't know, because, you know, like, like, you know, the pros and cons of carbon trading. Like, I definitely think, you know, here's something too, because it's built into the capitalist system. And it's something that, as you were talking about, If we start using that language that capital, those in the capitalist system can relate to and understand, then that's promising much more so than just going on saying, save the mangroves, save the mangroves.

KIMBERLY

And so I think that that, I think, though, my concerns always are, okay. Well, we need to have, it's that catch 22, right? In order for development to happen, you have to have money going into these developed areas, developing areas, but where is that money going to come from? And right now, a lot of those developing countries, especially now talking about mangroves, you know, they don't have that extra money for those, what I always think of as back burner policy issues. You got to care about like, are your people like getting vaccinated? You know, are they getting adequate nutrition? You know, what is the latest? you know mortality yeah yeah exactly those sorts of things can we get the diarrhea rates down amongst children below you know under five and you know all of those things are just really hard pressing issues and then well you're not going to get

JORDEN

mortality yeah

KIMBERLY

yeah exactly those sorts of things can we get the diarrhea rates down amongst children below you know under five and you know all of those things are just really hard pressing issues and then well you're not going to get the sort of funding and backing and attention and loans and everything that you need in the international community, unless you've got hard economic data that you're developing, you've got a good credit rating. And so when you start looking at those financial aspects and the investment aspects and all that political economy stuff, even something as basic as what is the value of the currency today? When you start looking at all those things, as a government, you have to. That's got to be number one right in front of your face, on your radar, and the mangroves be damned. So that's the hard thing when I come down to it and I know how the world works. This is why the idealist in me is always crushed when I see what the reality seems to be. But then when we go through this episode and actually look at the numbers and stuff, then I feel a little bit more hopeful, which is why... I can see, too, what you were saying as people were listening, just going through like, oh, wow, how are they going to come out the back end of this? And but but then also maybe hearing those numbers, people were a little more like, oh, yeah, I can't be a little optimistic about this.

JORDEN

Yeah, I think the hard part of diving into these, right, like you get to you get into the details of why it's so bad. And it seems like it's even worse than when you kind of do it at a high level. But conversely, knowing the actual scope, right, and then knowing the current state. can make it less nebulous. And I find that that usually is what, it's not even that I think that it's better than I thought, right? Because again, the fact that we've already lost 30%, right? We're not great, but it's naming it to tame it, that fear, right? Putting some of the numbers around it and understanding the scope takes it out of this, oh it's a lot scary just to say we're losing all our mangroves. Then here's the numbers and here's what's happening and where the pressures are. And now we can look at it, right? Well,

KIMBERLY

I think also it's a much more tangible thing that people can relate to. Unlike, we just talk about climate change as, like you said, this big, giant, multifaceted, behemoth thing. And like, what on earth can I possibly as an individual do? But I, as an individual, can go and visit mangroves and take enjoyment out of them. And then maybe I have more of an incentive to, hey, like, okay, I'm going to donate a little, you know, so what? I donate five bucks or something. Or I went and I gave a little extra money when I went to go visit, whatever. But that's something that can make a bit of a difference.

JORDEN

Or even just knowing that they're not just this cool local feature that you've grown up with, but they're actually a major driver of benefits to the globe. Like I think those deeper connections with a place, right? And how important it is, is something that can drive sustainability efforts as well. So if you liked what we did by breaking this episode up into two,

KIMBERLY

liked what we did by breaking this episode up into two, let us know. If you missed part one, go back and listen to part one of Mangroves. If you enjoyed the episode, please let us know and contact us, especially by email at splanetpod at gmail .com. We're on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube. You'll find these links to our show notes on our website, along with additional resources from today's episode and my sub stack posts that are always relevant somehow. We'd really appreciate if you'd rate and review Sustainable Planet on your podcast app. And thanks for listening. Have a sustainable day.