The Great Blue Wall Initiative: At the nexus of climate change, nature conservation, and the blue economyNassim Oulmane and Thomas Sberna

AFRICA IN FOCUS

The marine and coastal areas along the eastern shores of Africa contain rich, biodiverse, and under-threat flora and fauna unique for their biodiversity. The region hosts pristine coral reefs, carbon-rich mangrove forests, and sheltered seagrass beds, which support an abundance of marine life including important fish species, sharks and rays, turtles, sea birds, and marine mammals. Moreover, all along the coasts of the West Indian Ocean (WIO) region, coastal communities derive their socioeconomic livelihoods from the sea and its products. Artisanal and commercial fishing is critical for food security and the economy of the over 70 million people living along the coast, as the region’s fishing contributes to 4.8 percent of the global fish catch, equivalent to about 4.5 million tons of fish per year. Marine assets in the WIO are valued conservatively at $333 billion and provide at least $21 billion every year to the regional economy from marine and coastal tourism, carbon sequestration, and fisheries. 

Unfortunately, due to climate change, the deterioration of the WIO ecosystem is accelerating, creating dramatic impacts for biodiversity, as well as human societies—particularly coastal communities, through food insecurity, sea level rise, and storm surges. Threats are mounting from unchecked coastal development; mangrove deforestation; illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing; shipping traffic; resource overexploitation; destructive fishing practices; unregulated tourism; oil and gas exploration; and heavy-sands mining. Combined, these mounting pressures have already led to the loss of unprotected coral reefs, mangroves, seagrasses, and fish stocks, which, in turn, will continue to cripple local livelihoods and erode the WIO’s blue economy.  

Of course, the deterioration has broader global impacts too: The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) estimates that, at the global level, when coastal ecosystems like mangroves, salt marshes and seagrasses are degraded, lost, or converted, massive amounts of CO2—an estimated 0.15-1.02 billion tons every year—are released into the atmosphere or ocean, equivalent to up to 19 percent of global carbon emissions from deforestation.   

In Lisbon next week (June 27 –July 1), the United Nations Ocean Conference will explore innovative solutions for solving these and related challenges and creating a regenerative blue economy. The “Great Blue Wall” (GBW) initiative, which was recently touted at the 2022 Africa Regional Forum on Sustainable Development earlier this year, is one potential mechanism. 

THE GREAT BLUE WALL INITIATIVE, AN OPPORTUNITY TO ACT AT SCALE 

The GBW is a major Africa-led effort toward creating a nature-positive world—one that enhances the resilience of the planet and societies to halt and reverse nature loss—by 2030. GBW proponents aim to create interconnected protected and conserved marine areas (“seascapes”) to counteract the effects of climate change and global warming in the WIO region while unlocking the potential of the blue economy to become a driver of nature conservation and sustainable development outcomes.  

These seascapes will form a regional network of inclusive, fair, and productive large-scale marine-conserved areas that will deliver both socioeconomic and conservation outcomes by promoting regenerative practices and sustainable use of natural resources that benefit local livelihoods. Local stakeholders, first of which are indigenous people and local communities, will play a central role in the effective management of the connected network and will be supported in their efforts to sustainably use and benefit from natural resources. In term of figures, the GBW’s ambition is to protect 2 million km² of marine areas, restore 2 million hectares of critical coastal and marine ecosystems, and thus help sequester 100 million tons of CO2 and create 1 million blue jobs by 2030.