30 Years of Innovation and Excellence: GRID-Arendal Annual Report 2019

Discovering and helping to conserve critical seagrass meadows

A notable scientific discovery happened during an expedition by experts from GRID-Arendal and Sierra Leone’s Environmental Protection Agency in 2019: they found seagrass in Sierra Leone for the first time. The finding came about through the ResilienSEA project, funded by the MAVA Foundation, which is working to protect and expand knowledge about seagrasses in seven West African countries. This discovery took place after national experts were trained during a regional technical workshop in Senegal in March 2019. During this workshop, more than 45 participants from all seven countries spent a week building their capacity to manage seagrass meadows. This workshop was then followed by a series of national trainings for a greater number of experts at the country level, with the first three taking place in Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, and Sierra Leone. Also in 2019, GRID-Arendal hosted seagrass experts from around the world at our office to work on a global synthesis report on seagrasses, to be released by UNEP

in 2020. The report will highlight the values, goods, and services that seagrasses provide to people around the world, serving as a call to action for managers and decision-makers. And we published “People of Seagrasses” profiles on our website to shine a spotlight on individuals working to preserve these vital ecosystems and the communities they serve.

KEY NUMBERS

7

countries that are home to ResilienSEA pilot projects

7

estimated percentage of the world’s seagrass habitat that is lost each year

72

number of known seagrass species

18

estimated percentage of the world’s marine carbon that is stored by seagrasses, though they only cover 0.1 per cent of the ocean floor

GRID-Arendal seagrass scientist Maria Potouroglou on mission in Joal, Senegal.

15