Reefs at Risk Report Release

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Destruction of the Coral Reefs
By Laura Leyda and Jennifer Engler
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Coral Reefs

• What they are
• Why they are important
• How they are being destroyed
• How to help preserve them

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How are Coral Reefs Made?

• Corals (tiny animals, called polyps) secrete
  stony cup of limestone around themselves as a
  skeleton
• The polyps divide as they grow and form coral
  colonies - As the coral colonies build up on top
  of each other, they gradually form a coral reef
• Individual colonies may be up to 1000 years old
  Coral reefs may be many thousands of years old

Polyps
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Reef locations

• Grow mainly in warm areas between Tropic of
  Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn
• Most diverse is the Great Barrier Reef in
  Australia - over 3000 different plants and animals

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Types of Reefs

• Fringing Reef lie around islands continents
  are separated from the shorelines by lagoons
• Barrier Reef grow on the edge of continental
  shelves and also are separated from shorelines
  by lagoons
• Atolls a central lagoon and are circular or
  sub- circular. There are two types of atolls
  deep sea atolls that rise from deep sea and
  those found on the continental shelf.

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Types of Reefs
Fringing Reef
Barrier Reef
Atolls
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Why Reefs Are Important

• Biodiversity importance
• As a Food Resource
• Source of Economic Wealth
• Medicinal Use

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Coral reefs are often called the Rainforests of
the Sea

• About 4,000 species of fish and 800 species of
  reef-building coral have been identified

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As a vital food source

• Globally, one-fifth of all animal protein
  consumed by humans comes from marine environments
• Coral reefs providefood for one billionpeople
  in Asia alone

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Economic importance due to tourism ...

• Floridas reefs contribute 1.6 billion to the
  economy from tourism alone
• Caribbean countries derive half of their GDP
  from tourism(8.9 billion in 1990)

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Coral reefs can save human lives...

• Treat infections, viruses, and other diseases
• Prevent and treat skin cancer
• Provide bone grafts

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Coral reefs are a valuable resource

• Average Global Value of Ecosystem Services
  (/HA/YR)

"As the 'rain forests of the sea,' coral reefs
provide services estimated to be worth as much as
375 billion annually, a staggering figure for an
ecosystem covering less than one percent of the
Earth's surface."   --U.S. Coral Reef Task Force,
March 2000
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Threats to Coral Reefs From

• Coastal development
• Pollution
• Marine
• inland
• Overfishing/ Destructive fishing
• Overexploitation of Resources
• Natural Disturbances

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Coastal development ...

• Dredging
• Construction materials
• Building on reefs
• Unregulated tourism

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Tourism/ Recreation

• corals easily broken by trampling when people
  walk out to the reef
• snorkelers and divers may kill polyps simply by
  touching coral colonies

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Marine Pollution

• Oil spills
• Discharge of oily ballast water
• Large power plants change water temperatures by
  discharging extremely hot water into the coastal
  water

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Inland Pollution

• Erosion from increased forest clearing intense
  agriculture causes silt to wash into water,
  clouding it, and suffocating the coral
• Sewage agricultural fertilizer runoff increases
  nutrients in ocean, which produces more seaweed
  that hurts the coral
• Lack of sunlight from eutrophication/turbidity
  can cause bleaching

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Overfishing

• removal of reef fish causes ecosystems to be
  unbalanced
• allows more competitive organisms, such as
  algae, to become dominant

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Destructive fishing damages reefs

• Due to decreased yields, fishermen forced to
  change methods to catch enough fish to sustain
  needs
• Fishing with cyanide
• Blast Fishing
• Not only do these practices kill all fish in the
  affected areas but also severely damage the corals

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Destructive fishing practices in Southeast Asia
are widespread
Areas at High Risk
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Overexploitation

• Corals popular as decorations, jewelry, and
  souvenirs
• People collect pieces of coral themselves
• buy pieces from a "curios" shop shops receive
  corals from well developed colonies to make them
  the most money
• Coral is also mined used to build houses and
  make roads, or is burnt to make lime.
• Use for aquariums

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Natural disturbances

• Destroyed by hurricanes and tropical storms
• Diseases, such as black-band disease spreads
  over colonies, progressively killing the polyps
• The crown-of-thorns starfish feeds on corals, if
  many, can reduce a reef to a mass of dead coral
  skeletons quickly

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Coral Bleaching

• greenhouse effect - may cause increases in sea
  temperature
• Sea water that becomes too warm causes corals to
  turn white, or bleach, a reaction that occurs if
  coral polyps are stressed.

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Overexploitation and coastal development are the
greatest threats to reefs
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The Reefs at Risk indicator
Low Risk
Medium Risk
High Risk
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Disturbing Results

• 58 of the worlds reefs are at risk from human
  activities
• Reefs of Southeast Asia are the most threatened
• 90 of reefs are overfished
• Almost two-thirds of Caribbean reefs are
  threatened

Coral Graveyard
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The worlds reefs are not sufficiently protected
...

• 40 countries contain no protected reef areas
• Management goals of most marine protected areas
  (MPAs) are not met

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Preserving Coral Reefs

• Reefs at Risk
• Project to make people aware of the status of
  coral reefs
• Has developed series of indicators of human
  pressures on coral reefs

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Treating sewage protects reefs and human health
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Solutions to threats of Coral Reefs ...

•   Promote sustainable use of marine resources.
•   Impose environmental regulations on imports of
  fish that are caught using blast or cyanide
  fishing methods.
•   Increase number and size of marine protected
  zones.
•   Encourage research and testing on aquaculture
  that could provide a large supply of desirable
  seafood.

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Solutions Continued

• Increase public education on the value of coral
  reef animals and plants to the entire planet
•   Continue monitoring coral reefs to evaluate the
  impacts and solutions to these impacts and to
  determine if management practices are working and
  whether endangered species are recovering.

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Seven success stories
Bermuda
Apo
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Healthy Reefs