Threats to coral reefs at local and regional scales: science for solutions
Terence Done,
Australian Institute of Marine Science, PMB#3, Townsville MC, Qld., 4810, Australia
Email: t.done@aims.gov.au
The dire plight of the world’s coral reefs is now passé, and it is time for reef scientists to
refocus. It is now well known that many of the world’s coral reefs are in trouble, after
centuries of increasing pressure from the growing global population of humans; land based
runoff, overfishing and climate change are the main culprits; reef biodiversity and
productivity and physical integrity of reef structure are the victims. This degradation of coral
reefs has cost local human populations dearly in terms of loss of ecosystem services such as
fisheries, shoreline protection, tourism attractiveness and opportunities for bio-discovery.
Science has been at the forefront in characterizing these problems, and it now needs to
increasingly focus on solutions. Tactically, the solutions in vogue today, and that need the
support of science, seek to cure symptoms of degradation that are common on coral reefs
worldwide: environmental degradation; depletion of fisheries resources; breakdown of
ecological processes necessary for resilience. The corresponding categories of solution are;
environmental rehabilitation; fisheries management; marine protected areas, all implemented
with one eye on the compounding, unmanageable impacts of global climate change. The
latter are becoming manifest in coral reef regions as changed regimes of frequency and
severity of heatwaves, floods and hurricanes, plus deleterious changes in sea level and water
chemistry. The conservation and sustainable use of coral reefs while coping with climate
change is based on difficult concepts of risk minimization and promotion of resilience.
‘Ecosystem based fisheries management’ provides a very useful conceptual framework to
address the related issues of resilience-building and sustainable fisheries. On the one hand, it
embraces natural history and ecological processes, and on the other, the historical,
geographic, socio-economic, cultural and governance circumstances that must be the vehicle
of change.
Dr Terry Done
Terry Done is Leading Scientist at the Australian Institute of Marine Science. He is currently
leading a project in the Great Barrier Reef that builds scenarios of future implications of
climate change for coral reefs, and seeks to understand factors that determine spatial
variability in vulnerability to coral bleaching and resulting coral mortality. He was Secretary
of the Australian Coral Reef Society, 1990-1993, and President of the International Society
for Reef Studies, 1999-2002. Winner of the inaugural ‘best paper’ award for the journal
‘Coral Reef’ for his work on resilience in Great Barrier Reef coral populations under
predation pressure from outbreaks of crown-of-thorns sea-stars.
Dr Terry Done
Leading Scientist, Biodiversity and
Conservation Group
Australian Institute of Marine Science
PMB #3 Mail Centre,
Townsville Qld 4810 Australia
Phone 61 7 47 534 344
Fax 61 7 47 725 852
email: tdone@aims.gov.au