The Tree of Life

If mangrove trees had blood, the 54 000 km of Indonesian coastline would be indelibly red stained. In the last twenty five years, this massacre has reduced by more than 50% this complex amphibious ecosystem, capable of storing four times more carbon than any other inland tropical forest and to support a biodiversity that has no equal. In the coastal valley of Sawah Luhur, on West Java Island, the soil is burned up, fishing nets are empty like barren wombs, water has become a grave, strange signs of a sick Earth are appearing and fishermen no longer know how to decipher them. Everything is upside down: the night sky shines gold for the perpetual dawn of villages lit and has no more stars. The tree of life is dying under a Blood Moon: the network that inextricably links the life of every being on Earth has been torn apart. We all have lost. Follow the project on: http://journalismgrants.org/projects/a-fistful-of-shrimps