Environmental activists in Mombasa have called for concerted efforts in the regeneration of mangrove forests in Mombasa county.
Out of the five coastal counties, mangrove forests are in Kwale, Lamu, Kilifi, Tana River and Mombasa.
In Mombasa, five of the six subcounties; Mvita, Changamwe, Jomvu, Likoni and Kisauni have mangrove forests. Nyali subcounty does not have mangrove forests.
On Thursday, Kenya Forest Services Mombasa county conservator Jennifer Situma said they have in the last three years planted more than 2.3 million mangrove seedlings.
However, there is a need to plant mangroves in the county because they are ten times better compared to other terrestrial trees in terms of carbon absorption.
"The (Mangroves) are also fish breeding grounds in the sea. This is a critical biodiversity hotspot in the ecosystem that we must protect," she said.
Situma noted that due to the ongoing massive construction of structures such as roads, houses, and other infrastructure in the country, soil erosion is being experienced.
“The soil is carried by the water into the ocean leading to segmentation, and pollution thus suffocating the mangroves, tampering with their growth and regeneration,” she said.
To help the mangroves do well and more effectively, Situma called upon the public to stop clearing the terrestrial vegetation cover.
In addition, she singled out chang'aa brewing in the ocean as an activity that kills mangroves.
"Some people brew chang'aa in the mangrove near the sea. These dens poison mangroves and cut down their regeneration," she said.
She urged the communities to always alert the KFS when they see such things happening.
The official encouraged the people to engage in other economic activities like ecotourism, seaweed farming, mariculture and extraction of medicine for sale from seagrass so as not to affect the mangroves.
She was speaking during the Second Coastal Peri-Urban Mangroves Forum at the SwahiliPot Hub in Mombasa.
The event came two days after the International Day for the Conservation of the Mangrove Ecosystem.
It was convened by several organisations including Big Ship, Hand in Hand, Kenya Forest Service and Mombasa county among others.
Abdulsalm Omar, the director of Climate Change in Mombasa underscored the usefulness of mangroves in the past, present and posterity.
Omar, an environmental scientist said some parts of the county are fully exposed to hazards as they lack mangrove cover along the coastline.
"Nyali subcounty for example is under threat. It has no mangroves. Its coastline is dominated by hotels and therefore it lacks a natural buffer zone," he said.
Omar emphasised the need for various stakeholders to protect the mangroves from soil erosion so that in case El Nino happens, the communities living along the Coast shall not be at risk.
Furthermore, he asked the community members to help the government in identifying the people who are encroaching to prevent further dangers.
"Our community depends so much on the mangroves. Let's prevent encroachment of mangrove forests. Let's raise our voices when we see these things happen because we are courting a risk. We need to shout," Omar said.
Besides encroachment of the forests, the county official also raised alarm over rampant illegal logging, which he said has been on the rise in recent years.
He said that the county government will collaborate with the CBOs and the community members to identify and recruit mangrove scouts, to up their surveillance.
"We need to provide scouts who will be moving around to boost our surveillance of the mangroves, the way BMUs have scouts who do patrols along their beaches. We shall have a budget for these scouts," he said.
Collins Ogweno, an official from Hand in Hand organisation also asked the coastal residents to come up with plastic waste intervention measures such as recycling, repackaging, and reusing the plastics.
He said the plastics affect mangroves and suffocate fish.
(Edited by Tabnacha O)
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