Get paid to keep your mangroves

KOCHI: How about earning a little money for not destroying the mangrove in your backyard?

Well, the Forest Department is willing to pay you for conserving your mangroves � which help to fight off tsunamis and provide breeding grounds for fish.

The department, in its attempts to conserve biological diversity outside forests, has thought up a scheme to compensate the owners of mangroves for taking care of them � at the rate of Rs.4,000 an acre a year. Even if you have only a small stretch of mangrove forest, say 10 or 20 cents, you will still get paid depending on its extent.

B.S. Corrie, Chief Conservator of Forests (Biodiversity cell), told The Hindu that the scheme would be launched in a month and he hoped that it would help check the mindless destruction of mangroves along the States coastal and brackish-water regions. The department would help with planting of seedlings. Because of the uniqueness of mangrove ecosystems, such incentive schemes have been in place in countries such as Mexico, Costa Rica and Brazil.