Coastal resources, livelihoods and the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami in Aceh, Indonesia Christina Griffin a, c, * , David Ellis a , Sara Beavis b , Doracie Zoleta-Nantes c a Research School of Earth Sciences, Australian National University, Canberra ACT 0200, Australia b Fenner School of Environment and Society, Australian National University, Canberra ACT 0200, Australia c Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University, Canberra ACT 0200, Australia article info Article history: Available online 2 November 2012 abstract The 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami drastically altered the coastal zone of Aceh, Indonesia. Tsunami induced erosion of the coast, including aquaculture farms (tambak) and mangrove forests, destroyed livelihood opportunities and access to coastal resources. The following paper discusses impacts of the tsunami on coastal resources and the associated coastal and disaster management implications. Data is drawn from a time series of digitised mean high water marks (MHWM’s) sourced from Google Earth imagery, along with areal measurements of tambak, mangrove and casuarina cover and qualitative interviews with local residents. Two sites, namely, the Banda Aceh west coast and Lhok Nga Bay were studied. The results reveal that within these study sites 68% of mangroves and 92% of tambak ponds have not recovered since the tsunami resulting in the loss of between 241 and 725 tambak livelihoods and mangrove supplied resources including food, wood and shelter. Unique coastal environments respond to, and recover from, tsunami differently depending on factors such as tsunami characteristics, wave climate, sediment supply, vegetation, morphology and level of pre-disturbance human modification. While the study supports recent findings that mangrove and casuarina forests do not substantially mitigate the impact of large tsunamis, it strongly encourages their conservation for the environmental and economic sustainability of coastal communities. The study recommends that better integrated management of coastal resources such as mangroves and tambak, considering disaster management, environmental and economic concerns, will strengthen the resiliency of vulnerable coastal communities such as those in Aceh to future disaster. Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction On 26 December 2004, a magnitude 9.2 earthquake occurred along the Sunda Subduction Zone within 150 km of the Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam (NAD) province of Indonesia (Chlieh et al., 2007) (Fig. 1). This earthquake created a tsunami that propagated in a westward and eastward direction across the Indian Ocean. In Indonesia, onshore tsunami heights ranged from 1 to 30 m and inundated up to 5 km inland (Telford et al., 2006; Paris et al., 2007). A total of 811,409 people were displaced, 166,760 killed, 127,749 unaccounted for and greater than 1 million people affected (Athukorala and Resosudarmo, 2006). Beaches, dunes, tidal creeks, river channels, coral reefs, mangroves, seagrass beds and coastal forests were all severely impacted by the tsunami (Srinivas and Nakagawa, 2008). It is estimated that 90% of mangroves within Aceh were destroyed by the tsunami (Chen et al., 2005). The aquaculture and fishing industries were significantly impacted with 9000 ha of aquaculture farms (tambak) severely damaged or swept into the sea, and the extensive loss of fishing boats, jetties and market facilities (Athukorala and Resosudarmo, 2006; FAO, 2005). Beaches lost vast amounts of sand and sediment was deposited both off- and on-shore, particularly in topographic lows (Paris et al., 2007 , 2010; Liew et al., 2010). Paris et al. (2009) found that sand barriers protecting lagoons or river mouths were completely eroded and that extensive bank erosion and widening of river channels occurred. At 6 months after the tsunami Meilianda et al. (2010) found that Ulee Lheue on the north coast of Aceh still showed significant signs of erosion while Lhok Nga on the west coast had regained 60% of the sediment lost during the tsunami * Corresponding author. Crawford School of Public Policy Australian National University, Canberra, ACT 0200, Australia. E-mail address: Christina.e.griffin@gmail.com (C. Griffin). Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect Ocean & Coastal Management journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ocecoaman 0964-5691/$ e see front matter Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2012.10.017 Ocean & Coastal Management 71 (2013) 176e186