Natural capital, including “blue carbon”, is the next financial market, according to former International Monetary Fund assistant director and economist Ralph Chami. Māori and Pasifika are the custodians of the world’s biggest blue carbon real estate - the Pacific Ocean, Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa.
“Now the world is awakening to the fact that the industrial revolution was hugely detrimental for the planet and for people, Conservation International Aotearoa vice-president Mere Takoko says.
And so they really are looking to Indigenous people who actually look after the world’s last remaining biodiversity.”
What sea grass, salt marshes, mangroves, kelp forests and majestic whales have in common is that they are all living things that sequester carbon, particularly ‘blue carbon’.
Chami says “All of these things are living systems that are in high demand by a world that is trying to fight climate change and needs a healthy and thriving nature.”
And that nature-making includes the oceans - creating 50% of the world’s oxygen.
Oceans create 50% of world’s oxygen
A co-founder of Blue Green Future and Rebalance Earth, Chami says, “The world is demanding the services of the living nature. Who is sitting on the supply side is all of the island economies, all of these wonderful places, including indigenous people who have protected their natural capital if you’d like, or their nature.”
The world-leading marine ecologist and developer of the concept of blue carbon as a nature-based solution to climate change, Dr Carlos Duartre, says, “Blue Carbon is a relatively new concept because there has been a strategy for managing and sequestering carbon around forests already for 30 years but only in 2009 did we put forward the notion that we can also derive climate benefits by sequestering carbon, avoiding losses and restoring highly proactive marine habitats.”
Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa the biggest blue carbon real estate
Ko te Hauhā ki Tai, ko te hauhā, arā ko te CO2 tērā ka kapohia, ka puritia hoki e ngā rauropi moana me ngā pūnaha hauropi ki tahatai. Hei āta whakamārama ake, ko te moana me ngā mea koiora ērā e hao nui ana i te hauhā i te kōhauhau o te ao.
Blue Carbon is when carbon dioxide or CO2 is captured and stored by marine organisms and coastal ecosystems. In simple terms that’s the ocean and living things pulling in vast quantities of CO2 out of Earth’s atmosphere.
Examples are that a single whale can store up to 30,000 kilos of CO2 in its lifetime, while sea phytoplankton can capture 37 billion tonnes of CO2 yearly.
Duarte, who has published more than 900 scientific papers and ranked as one of the most influential scientists in the world, is working to rebuild the abundance of marine life by 2050.
Duarte, says, “So that concept that people are custodians of nature is very much aligned with cultural values and traditions of Māori people so it comes naturally when there is an engagement with nature. So you take from nature and you give back to nature.”
Studies show that blue carbon ecosystems provide co-benefits to people and nature, improving food, water, and economic security, tackling biodiversity, and protecting from climate change impacts.
Chami says “Māori people and the Pacific Islands can prove ownership and in many cases, they can actually prove the provenance, which is incredibly important. Once you know what you have, we can do the valuation of it and overnight it changes your situation. It could be a net debtor to a net creditor.”
Māori and Pacific leaders are leading in this area, and that’s with the Hinemoana Halo initiative. They are developing verifiable indigenous-led carbon credits through a $100 million finance vehicle to help protect, manage, monitor, and restore 2.2 Million KM2 of their coastlines and high seas by 2030.
Earlier this year, the leaders signed a declaration called He Whakaputanga Moana, giving whales rights, including the freedom of movement, a healthy environment, and the restoration of their populations.
Takoko says” Hinemoana Halo’s message is, it’s time for the people of the moana to rise.”
