Thriving mangrove ecology & local economy are both possible. The Sundarbans mangrove forests were cleared and settled on, in the 1850s, to increase revenue for the colonial government. The local economy is completely dependent on rainfed agriculture with paddy being the primary crop. It has an agrarian economy that has been imposed upon a mangrove ecosystem. The poorest of the poor, are extracting fish, crabs, honey, etc. from the forests at unsustainable rates. Over the years, farmers in the area developed many local varieties of rice, some of which were saline tolerant. However, in the 1990s, the govern­ment and market forces pushed in High Yielding Varieties(HYV) of rice which is not saline tolerant. Their advent, with a promise of higher yields, gradually sucked these farmers into the industrial farming value chain, where they lost control over seeds and had to buy HYV seeds, as well as other inputs like chemical pesticides and fertilizers, from the market. This gradually raised the social, ecological, economic costs of farming in the region. People are now faced with rising climate uncertainties like erratic localised weather patterns and cyclones. Unless the local economy is aligned with the mangrove ecology, local livelihoods will collapse in the near future. The first step towards this will be to make local agriculture disaster risk resilient. In the long term, it will require restoration/regeneration of the mangrove ecosystem in the inhabited islands and creation of harmonious livelihood relationship between people and the mangrove ecosystem. “ The irst step towards this will be to make local agriculture disaster risk resilient. In the long term, it will require restoration/regeneration of the mangrove ecosystem in the inhabited islands and creation of harmonious livelihood relationship between people and the mangrove ecosystem. “ For agriculture in the Sundarbans to become climate risk resilient, interventions need to focus on at least eight systemic focus points in the value chain. Image credit: Rabiul Islam Potential Impact: Transforming the local economy in the Sundarbans from what has developed through destruction and exploitation of the mangrove ecosystem to an economy that is harmonious and regenerative for the ecosystem and people. SOCIAL As per 2015 data, Kalitala has 6,434 households with a population of 24,462 persons(male: 12,694, female: 11,758). Schedule caste persons form 80.88% of the population, 3.74% belong to Schedule Tribes, 11.96% are Other Backward Class people and 3.42% belong to Muslim and general caste persons). ECOLOGICAL Kalitala Panchayat's total land area: 2,575 ha, Water bodies: 803 ha, Cultivated area: 1,204 ha, River bank embankment: 48 km ECONOMIC 28 local rice varieties reintroduced Resilience| Innovations| Culture| Empowerment or RICE was a pilot initiative co-created by Sundarban Unnayan Bhawan of Kalitala and Eco Logical Foundation of Delhi with a small Corporate Social Responsibility grant of 0.45 million by Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Limited in 2021. Please visit www.ricesub.in or see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3opO2NxtvA for more details. Based on learnings from the pilot, efforts have been initiated on creating a multi-stakeholder platform of organisations and enterprises aligned through shared universal values and committed to finding nature based solutions to social, ecological and economic challenges faced in the Sundarbans ecosystem.