Mangrove forests provide many services, some of which are used mostly or exclusively by local people, often the relatively poor and marginalised. Here, such ‘local ecosystem services’ are defined as those benefitting people living zero to tens of kilometres from a forest. The provision of fuel, timber, fodder, crustacean, fin-fish and shoreline protection services are reviewed, and their relationships with global patterns in biodiversity and poverty are examined. Higher floral and faunal diversity in the Indo-West-Pacific, compared with the Atlantic-East-Pacific, correlate with a greater range of species exploited for fuel, timber, crustaceans and coastal protection. Whilst poverty is a strong predictor for reliance on some local services, such as fuel wood, it is not related to others, such as fin-fish; hence, local people may be ‘liberated’ from reliance on some services by increased income but use others to generate that wealth. The vulnerability of these services to climate change depends on local geomorphological, biological and social factors. Forests with good supplies of sediment and fresh water, and fauna with relatively simple life cycles, will probably be more resilient. Greater wealth (or investment) may permit people to shift from capture to aquaculture fisheries and to show flexibility in the face of changing or reduced service provision