Little by little, India restores its lost mangroves Image Although mangroves play a vital ecological and protective role, they face both natural and man-made challenges. Credit: Andhra Pradesh Forest Department My excitement grew as we approached Muthupet, some 350 kms south of Chennai in Tamil Nadu. It was seven years after the devastating 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, and I was visiting the region’s protected mangrove forests to do a story on their regeneration under the World Bank supported Emergency Tsunami Reconstruction Project (ETRP). As we boarded the Forest Department boat to reach the restoration area, I remember seeing a group of women wading across the shallow channel, their sarees hitched neatly above their knees as they picked their way through the gently flowing waters. “They’re on their way home after planting mangrove saplings along recently-dug canals,” a uniformed forest guard told me.