Socio-political potential of blue carbon economies in SE Asia

Poverty and climate change are inextricably linked, so they must be tackled together.

Nature-based solutions could achieve this, and blue carbon – the storage of carbon by coastal ecosystems such as mangrove forests – is a favoured candidate because of its wide-ranging benefits such as income diversification, improved ecosystem health and spillover effects for other economies such as fishing.

Least Developed Countries (LDCs) have the greatest potential for benefit gain because of their significant blue carbon ecosystem extent, capacity for extensive blue carbon restoration and strong ambition for sustainable development.

However, blue carbon policy (in LDCs and more widely) remains hindered by an inadequate natural science base, community hesitancy and slow political mobilisation.

Taking a comparative case-study approach in Cambodia (LDC) and Vietnam (Lower Middle Income Country), we address these gaps to define the potential of, and pathway to implementation for, LDC blue carbon policy via 5 objectives: (1) quantify blue carbon market potential, (2) evaluate community priorities, (3) assess the community value placed on blue carbon, (4) identify regional-scale LDC policy challenges across SE Asia and (5) construct a local-national scale LDC roadmap for realising blue carbon benefits.

Working across the environment-public-policy nexus, we will enable sustainable LDC development, with joint benefits for the multidimensional perspectives of poverty and environmental health.