Mangrove ecosystems develop in tropical and subtropical intertidal areas, comprising roughly 70 woody plant species occupying an estimated 14.8 million ha globally (FAO, 2020). They are nursery areas for juvenile fish and other aquatic animals and provide habitats for both terrestrial and aquatic fauna (Hogarth, 2015). They play a direct role in shaping coastal landscapes by modulating complex sedimentary, hydrologic, and climatic cycles (Godoy & Lacerda, 2015) and carbon sequestration (Donato et al., 2011, Alongi, 2012). Mangroves also mitigate stochastic events like cyclones and tsunamis (Sandilyan & Kathiresan, 2015). By providing an array of goods and services, mangrove ecosystems support the livelihoods of many coastal tropical communities worldwide (Bandaranayake, 1998; Walters et al., 2008), totalling around 100 million people living within 10 kilometres of large mangrove forests (UNEP, 2014). Moreover, mangroves carry socio-cultural values, although these are typically underrepresented in most ecosystem valuation assessments (James et al., 2013; de Souza Queiroz et al., 2017; Himes-Cornell et al., 2018; IPBES, 2022).
Despite their essential functions for tropical coastlines, mangrove ecosystems showcase one of the major impact of anthropogenic change, with a global loss of 1.04 million ha between 1990 and 2020 (FAO, 2020) and this even though 42% are under a protected area designation (Spalding & Leal, 2021). Their clearing for aquaculture, urbanization and coastal landfill, and their deterioration by pollution, upstream land uses, sea level rise and climate change, have brought scientists to consider the prospect of the disappearance of mangroves worldwide within a century (Alongi, 2002 ; Duke et al., 2007). Mangroves are not an isolated case, the last Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) global assessment report on degradation and restoration shows that three-quarters of the planet’s land surface is considered as ‘degraded’, around 87% of wetlands have disappeared since 1700 (Davidson, 2014) while areas covered by living coral reefs have roughly halved since 1870 (Brondizio et al., 2019). Adding up to these environmental issues, anthropogenic climate change continues to exert worldwide impacts on human societies, living organisms and the geosphere at different scales (IPCC, 2022; Wheeler and Von Braun, 2013; Doney et al., 2012; Zundzewicz et al., 2018).
Small island developing states (SIDS) comprise 58 countries that, despite being disproportionately vulnerable to climate change impacts, as well as environmental and economic shocks (Terauds and Zhuawu, 2021), are underrepresented in studies addressing related issues (Robinson, 2020; Kelman et al., 2021). The recent COVID-19 pandemic has further weakened the socio-economic situation of SIDS, and recent studies suggest a slow and long recovery from this global event (Gu et al., 2022; Kim, 2020). In Mauritius, a SIDS located in the Western Indian Ocean, rapid and sustained anthropogenic activities continue to impact biodiversity and ecosystems (Florens et al., 2017; Gosling et al., 2017), with native habitat cover today remaining at about 4.4% of the total island extent (Hammond et al., 2015) as compared to 82.5% in 1773 (Florens, 2013).
The island is considered as a biodiversity hotspot and exhibit fragile ecosystems such as mangroves, seagrasses, coral reefs and wetlands, but coastal areas of the island are in the middle of socio-ecological tensioning. The tourism sector, in particular luxurious and high-class tourism, is a major economic pillar of the island (Anisimov et al., 2020). The island boasted nearly 1.3 million international tourist arrivals in 2019 though the number declined in 2020 (308,980) and 2021 (179,780) (Statistics Mauritius, 2022), mostly because of the pandemic-associated travel restrictions. Coastal development has brought employment and economic growth, but has also exerted increasing pressure on marine and intertidal ecosystems, especially wetlands and mangroves. Out of 209 coastal wetlands surveyed in 2011, most were exhibiting edge-related disturbances and more than half were fragmented (Laurance et al., 2012). Hammond et al. (2015) reported that twelve out of the fourteen environmentally sensitive areas (ESAs) in Mauritius are at risk of degradation, with six coastal and marine ESAs types, including mangroves, being exposed to urban expansion and resource over-use.
Compounding development impacts, an ecological disaster struck the southeast coast and communities of the island in August 2020. A Japanese owned carrier bulk vessel, the Panama-flagged MV Wakashio, ran aground on coral reefs in late July that year, and released some 1,000 tons of oil into the region’s lagoon on the 6th of August, with a portion of that oil depositing on rocky shorelines and in mangrove forests (Gurumoorthi et al., 2021; Scarlett et al., 2021; Seveso et al., 2021). Registered fishers have received pandemic and oil spill related compensation, but registration is male dominated and women who rely mostly on artisanal fishing, crustacean collection, and fishing bait collection in mangroves, have not been able to receive compensation (Naggea et al., 2021). While the impacts of the global COVID-19 pandemic were already affecting the coastal areas relying on tourism and fisheries, this oil spill is considered by many as the worst ecological disaster Mauritius has ever experienced since its independence in 1968, and has exacerbated socio-economic difficulties of many households of the region (De Rosnay et al., 2021).
Mangroves socio-economic importance is poorly referenced in Mauritius, as well as their associated provisioning and cultural services. In the island, mangroves have a historical use in traditional medicine as poultice on wounds, teas against haemorrhages, and for their antihypertensive and anti-diabetic properties (Gurib-Fakim & Brendler, 2004), but these practices have declined due to lifestyle and income changes. Moreover, with loss of mangroves, coastal households have come to rely more on small-scale fisheries outside mangrove areas, for their food and income security (Soondron, 2010) but here too, artisanal fisheries have been declining (Ollivier, 1993; Soondron, 2010; United Nations Development Program, 2015). Restrictions on collecting and using mangrove parts have also declined because of the Fisheries and Marine Resources Act (2007) which provides legal protection to remaining mangrove patches.
More recently, a study on the perceptions of local communities on mangroves and their associated ecosystem services in the South-West of Mauritius, revealed little to no direct dependence on mangrove products (Abib & Appadoo, 2021). However, the study identified strong importance associated to recreational activities and cultural services, suggesting that coastal communities have high cultural values for mangroves. Various studies from Bangladesh, Brazil and Mexico report mangroves’ cultural services including recreational and tourism activities, aesthetics values, maintenance of traditional ecological knowledge, environmental education and cultural heritage among others (Uddin et al., 2013 ; de Souza Queiroz et al., 2017 ; Reyes-Arroyo et al., 2021). By encompassing complex social and ecological couplings, mangroves are global socio-ecological systems (SES) (Cormier-Salem, 1994; Walters et al., 2008; Nagendra, 2009; Blanco-Libreros & Estrada-Urrea, 2015).
This study aims at bridging the gaps on mangroves socio-economic and cultural importance for coastal communities in Mauritius, with a focus on the eastern coastal areas and a multiple crisis context, using an ecosystem services (ES) framework. Implemented worldwide to assess the contributions made by the structure and function of ecosystems to human well-being (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005), the ecosystem services framework however faced strong criticism for its anthropocentric and utilitarian view of nature (Ridder, 2008; Redford & Adams, 2009; Fairhead et al., 2012; Raymond et al., 2013), and for the shortcomings of the evaluation methods, which have been mostly monetary (McCauley, 2006; Sagoff, 2008; Turnhout et al., 2013). Recognising these controversies, this study’s approach encompasses socio-economic determinants of mangroves dependency for ecosystem services (Mallick et al., 2021), the linkage between ecosystem services, human well-being and mangroves dependency (Kadaverugu et al., 2021; Dawson & Martin, 2015), as well as the impact of internal and external events on mangrove dependency.
More specifically, during this study, the following research questions were investigated:
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What are the current provisioning and socio-cultural services provided by mangroves in the east coast of Mauritius?
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How are internal socio-economic determinants affecting community members’ dependency on mangroves ecosystem services?
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How is mangrove dependency for ecosystem services affected by external environmental and socio-
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economic pressures?