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The Great Barrier Reef - Source: Reuters
Australia's Great Barrier Reef, the world's largest living organism, is under grave threat from climate warming and coastal development, and its prospects of survival are poor, a major new report has found.
While the World Heritage-protected site, which sprawls for more
than 345,000 square km off Australia's east coast, is in a better
position than most other reefs globally, the risk of its
destruction is mounting.
"Even with the recent management initiatives to improve resilience,
the overall outlook for the Great Barrier Reef is poor and
catastrophic damage to the ecosystem may not be averted," a
government reef management body said in the report.
The five-yearly reef outlook report, aimed at benchmarking the
health of the reef, found climate change, declining water quality
from coastal runoff, development and illegal fishing were the
biggest dangers to the reef.
The study echoed findings by scientists belonging to the UN
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that the Great Barrier
Reef could be functionally extinct within decades, with deadly
coral bleaching likely to be an annual occurrence by 2030.
The reef was one of the most diverse and remarkable ecosystems in
the world, and populations of almost all marine species were still
large, the government's Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority
said in the report.
But some ecologically important species, such as dugongs, marine
turtles, seabirds, black teatfish and some sharks had declined
significantly, while coral diseases and pest outbreaks like
crown-of-thorns starfish appeared to be increasing and becoming
more serious.
Challenge ahead
A separate report by the Australian Institute of Marine Science,
also released, found ocean temperatures on northern parts of the
reef had been a degree above average through winter, pointing to a
bad year for coral bleaching.
"We know that a failure to act on dangerous climate change puts
at risk significant places like the Great Barrier Reef and this
report confirms the scale of the challenge ahead," Australia's
Environment Minister Peter Garrett said.
Bleaching occurs when the tiny plant-like coral organisms die,
often because of higher temperatures, and leave behind only a white
limestone reef skeleton.
Garrett and Queensland State Premier Anna Bligh unveiled a plan to
improve water quality on the reef.
It followed a report last year which found agricultural run-off
was killing the reef, with some sections already irreversibly
damaged.
The plan aimed to halve the runoff of harmful nutrients and
pesticides by 2013 and ensure 80% of agricultural enterprises and
50% of grazing operations were taking steps to reduce runoff.
The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) said the report added urgency
to a debate in Australia's parliament on laws to curb carbon
emissions, rejected last month by the upper house Senate and due
for a second vote in mid-November.
"We cannot sit back and let the world's largest and most iconic
reef system die on our watch," said WWF reef campaigner Nick
Heath.
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