AN AUDACIOUS scheme to plant the world’s desert coastlines with mangrove trees is being condemned by marine biologists as a potential disaster for coral reefs.
The scheme is the brainchild of a retired American cell biologist, Gordon Sato. He wants to plant mangroves along hundreds of kilometres of coastline in Mexico, Arabia and elsewhere. His first quarter million trees are already growing close to coral reefs on the shores of the Red Sea in Eritrea.
“The object is to create whole new forests of mangrove trees in vast areas of the world,” says Sato. He believes that mangroves will fight poverty by providing fodder for goats,…
