Side Event

Coastal biodiversity—improvement measure for global environment through restoration of coastal ocean

Organizer
MINISTRY OF LAND, INFRASTRUCTURE, TRANSPORT AND TOURISM OF JAPAN

Date and Time
20 October 2010 15:0 - 18:0

Meeting
Tenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP 10)

*In October 2009, the UN agencies etc. (including UNEP) published a report, in which notes that “Out of all the biological carbon (or green carbon) captured in the world, over half (55%) is captured by marine living organisms – not on land – hence it is called blue carbon.”. In CO2 absorption by marine organisms (referred to as “the Blue Carbon”), organisms in coastal waters are said to play a major role. The Blue Carbon approach, which is suitable for the Japanese land with the 6th longest shoreline, will become a focus of world attention. *Although restoration of seagrass/seaweed beds and tidal flats have been undertaken from the viewpoints of marine environmental restoration, fisheries promotion, recovery of interactive space between citizens and the sea in Japan, adding a new viewpoint of “contribution to the solution of the global environmental problem” will be expected to accelerate the existing approaches above. *In this session, we will introduce the concept of “the Blue Carbon” getting attention as a carbon sink against global warming first, and then present Japanese leading-edge techniques for marine restoration widely, such as sand capping utilizing dredged soil, effort to conserve and restore seagrass/seaweed beds and tidal flats, installation of organism-coexisting structures.