Challenge

REVIVE builds scalable, evidence-based pathways for just restoration in Malaysia. Mangroves buffer storms, sustain fisheries, and store carbon, yet top-down, science-only restoration have seldom delivered self-sustaining models that balance climatebiodiversity with fair livelihoods. Also, value chains draw on mangrove resources, but channel rents to intermediaries, leaving communities in low-skill roles facing trade-offs exacerbating social inequality and ecological loss.

REVIVE develops and tests hybrid co-governance that couples community participation (CP)-voice in decisions, grievance redress, shared monitoring with value chain (VC) upgrading into highervalue diversified products/services. We track impacts using three measures: Just Restoration Index (carbon, social, economic); Restoration Stewardship Index (collective capacity and agency); and a Restoration Imaginaries Index (shared future visions), alongside explicit trade-off analysis.

Working in Matang Mangrove Forest Reserve (MMFR), Sungai Acheh & Sungai Chenaam (SASCM), and Setiu Wetlands (SWMT) we run a RCT (Control; CP; CP+VC) integrated with habitatsuitability, blue-carbon modelling, co-production, digital ethnography, and agent-based modelling to identify CP×VC configurations that are effective and equitable.

Outputs include a Restorative Business Model Canvas, reporting app, open maps/datasets/code, policy and industry briefs, Community of Practice for scale-out. Communities (especially women and youth) gain agency, better jobs; state forestry/NGOs/ certifiers gain auditable metrics and evidence; firms gain ESG opportunities; donors gain carbon and justice baselines, supporting transformational change.

More on the project will be added soon.

In the meantime, explore our Projects page to discover the diverse portfolio of initiatives GCBC is supporting around the world, and see where our research is making an impact.