Climate change and mangrove forests

www.wetlands.org

Climate change is one of the most critical global environmental changes that the world is facing. It is widely accepted that global mean surface temperature has risen by around 0.5º C over the last century. Similarly, measurable increases in greenhouse gas concentration have occurred over the same period, and recent evaluations of global sea level changes suggest that the current average rate of rise is approximately 1.5 mm per year.
The principal natural threat to mangrove ecosystems comes from sea level rise and associate changes in sediment dynamics and salinity that will inundate the mangroves and erode their substratum. Climate change may also cause potential problems through changes in rainfall pattern, increased frequency of storms, altered CO2 levels and possibly the impact of ultra-violet radiation. In a broad geographical scale, climate change will affect mangroves principally through increasing temperature. Temperature changes will tend to shift mangroves to higher latitudes. If sea level rise exceeds sedimentation; mangroves will face problems such as erosion. This will reduce the extent of mangroves by undercutting their roots through sheet erosion across the swamp surface and creek banks. 'A possible 45 centimetres (18 inches) rise in the sea level by the year 2050 may inundate 75 percent of the Sundarbans', warned the Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
Mangrove forests are an important component of the global carbon cycle. They both influence or are influenced by climate change and their management or destruction will have a significant role on the course of global warming in the twenty-first century. So, a sustainable mangrove forest management initiative should be taken immediately.