Fed: Management the key to protecting reefs: report
By Chris Herde
BRISBANE, Dec 17 AAP - Australia's reefs were in better health than most of their counterpartsaround the world despite the continual threat of coral bleaching, a report has found.
The author of the Report on the Status of the World's Coral Reefs, Dr Clive Wilkinson,said there was good reason to be optimistic about the future of Australian reefs.
Based at the Australian Institute of Marine Science at Townsville, the Australian scientistis the leader of the Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network.
He said strategies implemented by the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority andWest Australian authorities had helped boost survival prospects.
Ensuring water quality, the protection of fish stocks and the development of sanctuarieshad given Australian reefs a better chance of recovering from coral bleaching than ifthey were left alone, Dr Wilkinson said.
Early this year, 60 per cent of the Great Barrier Reef showed significant bleachingbut had recovered enough for marine scientists to report only six per cent of coral actuallydying.
"Reefs, if they are left alone and not stressed, they will recover quite rapidly,"
said Dr Wilkinson.
"I'd say if you had a six per cent loss on a coral reef in three years' time you wouldnot see any damage.
"So we may see some loss in bio-diversity with coral bleaching but I can see the reefbeing there forever."
Dr Wilkinson said while Australian coral reefs were predominantly healthy, he warnedthe rest of the world's reefs were on "the cusp".
In 1998 mass coral bleaching killed off around 16 per cent of the world's coral stocks,but since then only half had shown signs of recovery.
Many reefs had showed a decline because of the effect of human activity which had impactedon water quality, fish stocks and may have introduced disease and predators like the Crownof Thorns.
"Reefs that are well managed are the ones showing up as bright lights with more coraland more fish," Dr Wilkinson said.
He believed that in time, most of the world's reefs would recover.
"I think we're about at the bottom of the J-curve and we're about to see major improvementsin coral reefs," he said.
"But there is one caveat and that is global climate change.
"That's the thing we can't predict but that's the thing we are starting to fear willcome on and hit coral reefs badly in the future."
AAP ch/jhm/cjh
KEYWORD: REEF
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