ITTO participates in international conference on blue carbon

The conference was organized by the university’s UNESCO Chair on Education in Biosphere Reserves for Sustainable Societies in collaboration with the UNESCO New Delhi Office and the International Society for Mangrove Ecosystems.

Conference participants stressed the importance of integrated systems of research, training, information and documentation on blue carbon ecosystems in support of resilient adaptation to climate change. It provided an opportunity to facilitate collaboration between internationally recognized researchers and teaching staff at the university and other institutions in Japan and elsewhere in the Asia-Pacific region.

ITTO was represented by Gerhard Breulmann (Director of Operations), Hwan Ok-Ma (Officer-in-charge of the Forest Management Division) and Tetra Yanuariadi (Projects Manager). Dr Yanuariadi made a presentation highlighting global challenges in mangrove conservation, such as deforestation, coastal landfill, encroachment, upstream land use, coastal development and reclamation. He also spoke about ITTO’s collaborative initiatives aimed at conserving and sustainably using mangrove ecosystems across the tropics, including field projects in Africa, Asia-Pacific and Latin America and the Caribbean and global-level actions such as publication of the World Atlas of Mangroves, the development of GLOMIS (a global mangrove database and information system), and co-hosting the 2017 International Conference on Mangrove Ecosystems.

Together with the Center for International Forestry Research and Germany’s Leibniz Centre for Tropical Marine Research, ITTO recently advised the governments of Indonesia and Germany on the establishment of the World Mangrove Center, which was launched by the President of Indonesia in June 2022.