Nature-Based Solutions: Enhancing Coastal and Marine Conservation in the Western Indian Ocean in Africa

The Western Indian Ocean (WIO) hosts some of the world’s most extensive and climate-resilient mangroves, seagrass and coral reefs. These ecosystems are crucial sources of food, coastal protection, and income for coastal populations. These assets are conservatively valued at US$333 billion and provide at least US$21 billion annually to the regional economy through tourism, carbon sequestration, and fisheries.

Nevertheless, real and significant threats such as overexploitation of fisheries, habitat clearing, and pollution are jeopardizing the integrity of the region’s marine ecosystems and their ability to provide goods and services to coastal communities. These threats are exacerbated by climate change impacts including sea-level rise, changes in sea temperature, ocean acidification, and storm events.

Therefore, it is critical to support resilient and productive ecosystems and the concept of Nature based solutions (NbS) to support coastal and marine conservation in the WIO region aims to provide insightful perspectives from global and local experiences across interconnected regenerative seascapes in Comoros, Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique, and Tanzania, where NbS serves to guide actions to protect, sustainably manage and restore coastal and marine ecosystems, enhancing livelihoods of local communities, while contributing for the 2030 agenda.