Bruce Moll

So you could ask, very simply, how much would you have to spend to keep your water that clean?

It's roughly about $31.22 per hectare per year.

And it gets you to think about nature in a different way than you had before.

Like a mother's love.

Okay.

I totally accept that there is this sort of priceless aspect of nature.

But if you are in the government in a very poor country, you have some tough choices to make.

If somebody comes to you and says, okay, you've got these lovely mangroves.

Now, it turns out that this sort of setting where the mangroves are is the perfect place for shrimp aquaculture.

We're going to put in these farms.

We're going to grow shrimp.

You are going to get millions and millions of dollars in tax revenue.

If you're thinking about the welfare of all the people in your country, many of whom are starving, that might be a really powerful argument.

Now, into that kind of a discussion, you can bring in the fact that these mangroves are sitting there very quietly doing all sorts of incredibly valuable things.

In fact, they've done these kind of calculations.

And in some cases...

the services that mangroves provide are four times more valuable than what you could get out with shrimp.

So it's stupid.

It's just stupid in a very basic sense to wantonly replace lots of mangroves with shrimp aquaculture.

Carl, when we were talking to him, told us... You know, there have been estimates that the value of the pollination that comes from wild bees...