There is climate value in Southeast Asia’s protected areas, but we’re failing to use it

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illuminem summarises for you the essential news of the day. Read the full piece on The Straits Times or enjoy below:

🗞️ Driving the news: South-east Asia’s coastal ecosystems — particularly mangroves and seagrasses — are emerging as critical but underused climate assets, capable of delivering large-scale carbon removal and resilience

🔭 The context: These “blue carbon” ecosystems capture carbon at roughly twice the rate of terrestrial forests and store it for millennia
• The Indo-Pacific hosts 37% of global mangroves and 23% of seagrasses, making the region a major reservoir of natural climate mitigation potential
• Beyond carbon storage, these ecosystems protect coastlines from erosion, reduce flood risks, support fisheries and sustain local economies
• Despite their value, they remain underprotected, with over a third of ASEAN’s mangroves lost between 1980 and 2020

🌍 Why it matters: Failing to protect blue carbon ecosystems not only removes future carbon capture capacity but also releases vast amounts of stored carbon back into the atmosphere
• Conservation offers far greater climate returns than restoration, yet funding still disproportionately favours rebuilding rather than preservation
• Many of these ecosystems already sit within protected areas, but their carbon value is rarely measured or integrated into policy, leaving a major climate opportunity untapped

⏭️ What’s next: ASEAN countries are being urged to expand and strengthen marine protected areas while integrating blue carbon into national climate strategies
• This includes improving measurement frameworks, increasing funding, and building local capacity to manage and monitor ecosystems effectively
• Policymakers are also pushing to embed blue carbon into planning and finance systems to unlock its full economic and environmental value

📈 One stat: Seagrass meadows in the Indo-Pacific alone sequester carbon worth up to $250 million annually

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