Krabi island turns green

23 May 2011

Environmental officials hope that the planting of mangroves on a Krabi island will help it lead the way in lessening harmful climate change. The project called Blue Carbon Storage will see 3,000 rai of land on Koh Klang replanted and rehabilitated with mangrove trees and shrubs.

Once the mangrove forests (usually referred to as walking forests) have developed it is hoped that they will capture and store carbon dioxide (CO²). The island of Koh Klang is near the mouth of the River Krabi and just a short distance from the provincial town capital of Krabi.

The Business Council for Sustainable Development in Thailand chose this Andaman Sea island to spearhead the country’s aim of becoming a low-carbon economy. A recent mangrove sapling planting ceremony was attended by Thailand Environment Institute professor Sanit Aksornkoae and representatives of companies such as Siam City Cement and the Electricity Generating Authority, who are sponsoring the initiative.

The professor said at the inauguration ceremony that it would be three years before the programme was fully in place and that six months of that would be spent checking current CO² levels and working out where changes can be made.

He told media representatives that coastal forests were able to hold higher levels of greenhouse gases than forests inland. He added that the country’s almost 3,000kms of shoreline was capable of holding vast quantities of the gases.

The mangrove forests that used be an instantly recognisable feature of the Thai coastline have declined by a third in recent times and now cover only 1.5 million rai, a loss that equates to over 400km².

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