Mauritius's National Mangrove Propagation Programme — Three Decades of State-Led Coastal Restoration

Mauritius's coastline lost much of its mangrove cover to reclamation and coastal development over the twentieth century, prompting the Ministry of Fisheries to launch a dedicated Mangrove Propagation Programme in 1995.
The Albion Fisheries Research Centre — now under the Ministry of Blue Economy, Marine Resources, Fisheries and Shipping — combines nursery-reared seedlings with direct propagule planting across the west, north, south and east coasts, at 21 identified sites.
As of the programme's most recent public reporting, over 400,000 mangrove seedlings and propagules have been planted across roughly 20 hectares, bringing Mauritius's total mangrove cover (natural and planted) to about 243 hectares of Bruguiera gymnorrhiza and Rhizophora mucronata; the UN SDG Partnership registry records that around 70% of the country's commercial fish species depend on mangrove sites as juvenile nurseries. Mangrove removal is now a punishable offence under the 2023 Fisheries and Marine Resources Act.
The restored area remains modest relative to Mauritius's roughly 180 km coastline, and an independent 2026 academic study of southeast Mauritius (Wetlands Ecology and Management) found decadal mangrove dynamics still uneven — some sites gaining cover, others losing it — arguing for a national restoration-target framework rather than site-by-site propagation alone.

Read the full analysis: https://sdgs.un.org/partnerships/critical-role-mangrove-ecosystem-coastal-and-ocean-resilience-mauritius