No abstract

Mangroves shelter coastlines during hazardous storm events with coastal communities experiencing mangrove deforestation are increasingly vulnerable to economic damages resulting from cyclones. To date, the benefits of mangroves in terms of protecting coastal areas have been estimated only through individual case studies of specific regions or countries. Using spatially referenced data and statistical methods, we track from 2000 to 2012 the impact of cyclones on economic activity in coastal regions inhabited by nearly 2,000 tropical and subtropical communities across 23 major mangrove-holding countries. We use nighttime luminosity to represent temporal trends in coastal economic activity and find that direct cyclone exposure typically results in permanent loss of 5.4–6.7 mo for a community with an average mangrove extent (6.3 m per meter of coastline); whereas, a community with more extensive mangroves (25.6 m per meter of coastline) experiences a loss equivalent to 2.6–5.5 mo. These results suggest that mangrove restoration efforts for protective benefits may be more cost effective, and mangrove deforestation more damaging, than previously thought.

Land degradation is a global problem that particularly impacts the poor rural inhabitants of low and middle-income countries. We improve upon existing literature by estimating the extent of rural populations in 2000 and 2010 globally on degrading and improving agricultural land, taking into account the role of market access, and analyzing the resulting impacts on poverty. Using a variety of spatially referenced datasets, we estimate that 1.33 billion people worldwide in 2000 were located on degrading agricultural land (DAL), of which 1.26 billion were in developing countries. Almost all the world’s 200 million people on remote DAL were in developing countries, which is about 6% of their rural population. There were also 1.54 billion rural people on improving agricultural land (IAL), with 1.34 billion in developing countries. We find that a lower share of people in 2000 on DAL, or a higher share on IAL, lowers significantly how much overall economic growth reduces poverty from 2000 to 2012 across 83 developing countries. As the population on DAL and IAL in developing countries grew by 13% and 15% respectively from 2000 to 2010, these changing spatial distributions of rural populations could impact significantly future poverty in developing countries.

No abstract

No abstract