The Power of Mangroves Over Seawalls
Context
● When Cyclone Dana made landfall near Bhitarkanika, Odisha, mangroves provided protection that costly coastal infrastructure often struggles to deliver.
● Climate change is multiplying threats along India’s 11,000-kilometre coastline, directly affecting around 250 million people.
What is Ecosystem-Based Adaptation (EbA)
● EbA uses biodiversity and ecosystem services to help communities adapt to climate change effectively.
● India’s coastline hosts mangroves, seagrasses, coral reefs and wetlands that act as natural buffers against climate impacts.
● Research identifies India as a global hotspot for coastal EbA, with mangroves protecting more people per hectare than almost any other country.
Proven Benefits of EbA
○ In the Sundarbans, over 18,000 women restored 4,600 hectares of mangroves, blunting the devastation of cyclones Amphan and Yaas.
○ Restoration also strengthened livelihoods through honey collection and crab farming, highlighting EbA’s social and economic co-benefits.
○ The MISHTI (Mangrove Initiative for Shoreline Habitats and Tangible Incomes) programme aims to restore 540 square kilometres of mangroves across nine states.
India’s Preference for Hard Infrastructure
● Coastal states spent Rs 2,641 crore on hard protection measures like seawalls, groynes and embankments over the last decade.
● The National Coastal Mission’s budget fell from Rs 195 crore in 2022-23 to Rs 50 crore in 2024-25.
● In Kerala, hard armouring protected specific sites while accelerating erosion and damage in adjacent areas.
Challenges
● EbA remains peripheral to India’s adaptation agenda due to fragmented mandates, weak monitoring and poor institutional coordination.
● Policy space is crowded with overlapping concepts such as Nature-based Solutions (NbS), Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA), Ecosystem-based Disaster Risk Reduction (Eco-DRR), creating serious ambiguity about what qualifies as EbA.
● Many ecosystem-based interventions are buried within broader sectoral programmes, making India’s EbA portfolio appear much weaker than it truly is.
● Without clear classification and tracking, India risks undercounting some of its most effective and equitable climate responses.
Way Forward
● India must move from dispersed projects to a coherent strategy embedding EbA within coastal planning and adaptation policy.
● Clear classification, monitoring and evaluation of EbA outcomes must be institutionalised to ensure proper financing and recognition.
● India must operationalise EbA as a core climate and development strategy, repositioning natural capital as its most resilient line of defence.
