Bleaching Events In Coral Triangle

While coral bleaching events due to increased sea surface temperatures have escalated throughout the Caribbean basin, Indo-Pacific reefs have faired somewhat better. A combination of isolation, greater oceanic circulation, and cold water upwelling have thus far provided insulation from massive warming and large-scale bleaching. But that insulation may be dissipating.

A recent news report from Indonesia's West Bali National Park indicates that increased sea surface temperatures are hitting Bali's coral reefs hard. A team comprised of researchers and conservationists from Greenpeace, WWF, and Reef Check have been monitoring water temperatures and bleaching events throughout the park's reef system. This news is particularly troubling considering that the mass bleaching is near the heart of the Coral Triangle, the global epicenter of marine biodiversity.

Surrounded by Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines, this extraordinary expanse of ocean covers an area of 2.3 million square miles (5.7 million km2), the equivalent to half of the entire United States. It is home to over 600 reef-building coral species, or 75% of all species known to science, and more than 3,000 species of reef fish. Over 150 million people live within the Coral Triangle, of which an estimated 2.25 million are fishers that depend on marine resources for their livelihood. Overfishing and destructive fishing (blast fishing, fishing with poisons) have already taken their toll on coral reefs throughout the triangle. Runoff and sedimentation from coastal development and mining, sewage, and coral mining for building materials and other uses have also stripped many reefs of their resiliency to guard against other stressors.

News of the decline of Bali's reefs comes on top of already slow-to-recover tourism to Bali following the terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005. During my visit to Bali last October 2006, popular tourist hubs such as the Kuta district and the upland resort town of Ubud were practically deserted. Foreign tourist numbers to the West Bali National Park have fallen dramatically, but it is unclear whether terrorism or the declining reefs are to blame. Just 3,206 foreign tourists visited the park in 2006, compared to 20,168 in 2000 – before the 2002 and 2005 Bali bombings.

With tourism as the lifeblood for funding marine protected area management and conservation, news of increased coral bleaching and its impact to coral reefs--one of the major tourist attractions--couldn't come at a worse time.