The tall trees in Gabon’s impenetrable mangrove swamps have helped make the central African nation one of the few net carbon absorbers, because plants catch greenhouse gas four times more quickly than land-based forests.

As the worldwide drive to mitigate climate change and UN talks on this issue get underway at the end of the month, countries like Gabon are attempting to determine how much carbon is trapped in their mangroves.

“We do not really have a lot of information on the mangrove forests compared to the terra firma forests,”Vincent Medjibe

“We do not really have a lot of information on the mangrove forests compared to the terra firma forests,” Vincent Medjibe, who gathers carbon data for the Gabonese National Park Service, said in a statement.

On the other side of the mouth of the mangrove-rich Pongara National Park the growing capital Libreville is exaggerated for the largest mangrove wall in the world.

On the outskirts, dry tusks and muddy holes are the remnants of a former swamp unlawfully cleared for construction.

In addition to its carbon storage the marshes are rich in wildlife and a natural flood protection system.

A resident asking only her name as Christella said she was concerned that the neighbours might not realise the danger.

The objective of those activities in Gabon is to reduce pressure on the mangroves in Libreville and the country’s Space Observatory is helping to monitor the mangroves lining almost half of the 1,485 km (1.485 miles) coastline, environment conservation chief Stanislas Stephen Mouba told Reuters.

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Climate change

Climate change includes both human-induced global warming and its large-scale impacts on weather patterns. There have been previous periods of climate change, (wikipedia)


National park

A national park is a natural park in use for conservation purposes, created and protected by national governments. Often it is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, (wikipedia)


Mangrove

A mangrove is a shrub or small tree that grows in coastal saline or brackish water. The term is also used for tropical coastal vegetation consisting of such species. (wikipedia)


national parks of the United States

The United States has 63 national parks, which are Congressionally-designated protected areas operated by the National Park Service, an agency of the Department of the Interior. (wikipedia)


National Parks of Canada

Canada’s National Parks are protected areas under the Canada National Parks Act, owned by the Government of Canada and administered for the benefit, education, (wikipedia)