Abu Dhabi Mangrove Initiative — Blue Carbon Restoration & Monitoring Programme

The Environment Agency – Abu Dhabi (EAD) has run a mangrove protection and restoration programme since the 1970s that has scaled sharply since 2015 under the Abu Dhabi Mangrove Initiative (ADMI), a joint effort with Emirates Nature-WWF, the Department of Municipalities and Transport (DMT) and other partners to expand and monitor the emirate's mangrove forests as a blue-carbon nature-based solution.

Mangrove cover in Abu Dhabi grew from an estimated 14,117 hectares in 2015 to roughly 17,600 hectares (176 km²) today, including 23 million mangrove trees planted in partnership with ADNOC and DMT over the two most recent years alone — equivalent to about 9,200 hectares — which EAD projects will sequester approximately 233,000 tonnes of CO2 annually once established. EAD reports that Abu Dhabi's blue-carbon ecosystems collectively store on the order of 41 million tonnes of carbon, and the emirate has set a target of 100 million mangrove trees planted by 2030.

To standardise practice, EAD, Emirates Nature-WWF and the Ministry of Climate Change and Environment co-published the Mangrove Restoration Guidelines for the United Arab Emirates, intended to give restoration and monitoring a consistent, science-based methodology nationally, and ADMI states an intention to move toward independent, evidence-based verification of planting and carbon claims.

As a caveat, the carbon and area figures cited here are agency-reported rather than certified by an external carbon standard such as Verra or Gold Standard; as of the sources reviewed, Abu Dhabi's mangroves had not been registered for third-party-verified carbon credits, so the programme is best read as a large, well-documented government restoration effort rather than a market-certified carbon-offset scheme.

Read the full analysis: https://www.ead.gov.ae/en/Media-Centre/News/Mangrove-Ecosystems