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Cuba is an ecological rarity in Latin America and the Caribbean region. Its complex political and economic history shows limited disturbances, extinctions, pollution, and resource depletion by legal or de facto measures. Vast mangroves, wetlands, and forests play key roles in protecting biodiversity and reducing risks of hazards caused or aggravated by climate change. Cuba boasts coral reefs with some of the region's greatest fish biomass and coral cover. Although it has set aside major protected areas that safeguard a host of endemic species, Cuba's environment is by no means pristine. Through much of its early history, deforestation and intensive agricultural production under colonial then neocolonial powers was the norm. Using remote sensing, we find Cuba's land today is 45% devoted to agricultural, pasturage, and crop production. Roughly 77% of Cuba's potential mangrove zone is presently in mangrove cover, much of it outside legal protection; this is likely the most intact Caribbean mangrove ecosystem and an important resource for coastal protection, fish nurseries, and wildlife habitat. Even the largest watersheds with the most agricultural land uses have a strong presence of forests, mangroves, and wetlands to buffer and filter runoff. This landscape could change with Cuba's gradual reopening to foreign investment and growing popularity among tourists-trends that have devastated natural ecosystems throughout the Caribbean. Cuba is uniquely positioned to avoid and reverse ecosystem collapse if discontinuities between geopolitical and ecosystem functional units are addressed, if protection and conservation of endemic species and ecosystems services accompany new development, and if a sound ecological-restoration plan is enacted.

Cuba is an ecological rarity in Latin America and the Caribbean. Its complex political and economic history shows limited disturbances, extinctions, pollution, and resource depletion by legal or de facto measures. Vast mangroves, wetlands, and forests play key roles in protecting biodiversity and reducing risks of hazards caused or aggravated by climate change. Cuba boasts coral reefs with some of the region's greatest fish biomass and coral cover. Although Cuba has set aside major protected areas that safeguard a host of endemic species, its environment is by no means pristine. Its early history is one of deforestation and agricultural production for colonial and neo-colonial powers. Using remote sensing, we find Cuba's land today is 45% devoted to agricultural, pasturage, and crop production. Roughly 77% of Cuba's potential mangrove zone is presently in mangrove cover, much outside legal protection; this is likely the most intact Caribbean mangrove ecosystem and an important resource for coastal protection, fish nurseries, and wildlife habitat. Even the largest watersheds with the most agricultural land uses have a strong presence of forests, mangroves, and wetlands to buffer and filter runoff. This landscape could change with Cuba's gradual reopening to foreign investment and growing popularity among tourists—trends that have devastated natural ecosystems throughout the Caribbean. Cuba is uniquely positioned to avoid and reverse ecosystem collapse if discontinuities between geopolitical and ecosystem functional units are be addressed, if protection and conservation of endemic species and ecosystems services accompany new development, and if a sound ecological restoration plan is enacted.

With the growing recognition that effective action on climate change will require a combination of emissions reductions and carbon sequestration, protecting, enhancing and restoring natural carbon sinks have become political priorities. Mangrove forests are considered some of the most carbon-dense ecosystems in the world with most of the carbon stored in the soil. In order for mangrove forests to be included in climate mitigation efforts, knowledge of the spatial distribution of mangrove soil carbon stocks are critical. Current global estimates do not capture enough of the finer scale variability that would be required to inform local decisions on siting protection and restoration projects. To close this knowledge gap, we have compiled a large georeferenced database of mangrove soil carbon measurements and developed a novel machine-learning based statistical model of the distribution of carbon density using spatially comprehensive data at a 30 m resolution. This model, which included a prior estimate of soil carbon from the global SoilGrids 250 m model, was able to capture 63% of the vertical and horizontal variability in soil organic carbon density (RMSE of 10.9 kg m−3). Of the local variables, total suspended sediment load and Landsat imagery were the most important variable explaining soil carbon density. Projecting this model across the global mangrove forest distribution for the year 2000 yielded an estimate of 6.4 Pg C for the top meter of soil with an 86–729 Mg C ha−1 range across all pixels. By utilizing remotely-sensed mangrove forest cover change data, loss of soil carbon due to mangrove habitat loss between 2000 and 2015 was 30–122 Tg C with >75% of this loss attributable to Indonesia, Malaysia and Myanmar. The resulting map products from this work are intended to serve nations seeking to include mangrove habitats in payment-for- ecosystem services projects and in designing effective mangrove conservation strategies. ; Full Text

With the growing recognition that effective action on climate change will require a combination of emissions reductions and carbon sequestration, protecting, enhancing and restoring natural carbon sinks have become political priorities. Mangrove forests are considered some of the most carbon-dense ecosystems in the world with most of the carbon stored in the soil. In order for mangrove forests to be included in climate mitigation efforts, knowledge of the spatial distribution of mangrove soil carbon stocks are critical. Current global estimates do not capture enough of the finer scale variability that would be required to inform local decisions on siting protection and restoration projects. To close this knowledge gap, we have compiled a large georeferenced database of mangrove soil carbon measurements and developed a novel machine-learning based statistical model of the distribution of carbon density using spatially comprehensive data at a 30m resolution. This model, which included a prior estimate of soil carbon from the global SoilGrids 250m model, was able to capture 63% of the vertical and horizontal variability in soil organic carbon density (RMSE of 10.9 kgm*3). Of the local variables, total suspended sediment load and Landsat imagery were the most important variable explaining soil carbon density. Projecting this model across the global mangrove forest distribution for the year 2000 yielded an estimate of 6.4 Pg C for the top meter of soil with an 86–729 Mg C ha*1 range across all pixels. By utilizing remotely-sensed mangrove forest cover change data, loss of soil carbon due to mangrove habitat loss between 2000 and 2015 was 30–122 Tg C with >75% of this loss attributable to Indonesia, Malaysia and Myanmar. The resulting map products from this work are intended to serve nations seeking to include mangrove habitats in payment-for- ecosystem services projects and in designing effective mangrove conservation strategies.

With the growing recognition that effective action on climate change will require a combination of emissions reductions and carbon sequestration, protecting, enhancing and restoring natural carbon sinks have become political priorities. Mangrove forests are considered some of the most carbon-dense ecosystems in the world with most of the carbon stored in the soil. In order for mangrove forests to be included in climate mitigation efforts, knowledge of the spatial distribution of mangrove soil carbon stocks are critical. Current global estimates do not capture enough of the finer scale variability that would be required to inform local decisions on siting protection and restoration projects. To close this knowledge gap, we have compiled a large georeferenced database of mangrove soil carbon measurements and developed a novel machine-learning based statistical model of the distribution of carbon density using spatially comprehensive data at a 30m resolution. This model, which included a prior estimate of soil carbon from the global SoilGrids 250m model, was able to capture 63% of the vertical and horizontal variability in soil organic carbon density (RMSE of 10.9 kgm*3). Of the local variables, total suspended sediment load and Landsat imagery were the most important variable explaining soil carbon density. Projecting this model across the global mangrove forest distribution for the year 2000 yielded an estimate of 6.4 Pg C for the top meter of soil with an 86–729 Mg C ha*1 range across all pixels. By utilizing remotely-sensed mangrove forest cover change data, loss of soil carbon due to mangrove habitat loss between 2000 and 2015 was 30–122 Tg C with >75% of this loss attributable to Indonesia, Malaysia and Myanmar. The resulting map products from this work are intended to serve nations seeking to include mangrove habitats in payment-for- ecosystem services projects and in designing effective mangrove conservation strategies.