NESP MaC Project 4.12 - Protecting valuable shoreline mangroves of northern Australia, 2024-2026 (JCU)

Updated: 2026-06-25

This record provides an overview of the NESP Marine and Coastal Hub study - Protecting valuable shoreline mangroves of northern Australia. For specific data outputs from this project, please see child records associated with this metadata. The mass death (~80 km2) and dieback of shoreline mangroves around the Gulf of Carpentaria (GOC) and across northern Australia in 1982 and 2015 was a wake-up call to the vulnerability and immense importance of marine coastal ecosystems like mangroves. It is essential that we fully understand the circumstances surrounding such catastrophic events, the environmental triggers identified, and what we might do to restore the damage while also preventing future occurrences. In response to the 2015 mass dieback event (the world’s largest such recorded event), the NESP commissioned an Emerging Priority project that utilised aerial surveys to assess the extent of the dieback along the entire Gulf of Carpentaria coastline. It is proposed to resurvey GOC shorelines for their current condition whilst taking the opportunity further to devise a well-considered and fully costed rapid response plan that will include innovative preventative management outcomes for the longer-term sustainability of threatened but highly-valued coastal marine ecosystems of northern Australia. Planned Outputs • aerial survey imagery [imagery] • satellite imagery analysis [spatial dataset] • field & environmental surveys [tabular dataset] • Final technical report with analysed data and a short summary of recommendations for policy makers of key findings [written]