Climate change beginning to take its toll

Ron Toft





It covers a huge area of roughly 6.8 million square kilometres in the waters of six countries in South East Asia and the Pacific—the eastern half of Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Timor-Leste, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands—where there are over 18,500 islands and 132,800 kilometres of coastline.
It sustains more than 100 million coastal people, supports multi-million dollar tuna, fishing and tourism industries and is home to 76 percent of the world’s reef-building corals, over 35 percent of the world’s coral reef fish species and six of the world’s seven different marine turtles.
It’s the Coral Triangle—the richest place on our planet in terms of biodiversity. But it’s in trouble—big trouble.
There is no single problem facing the triangle; more a whole raft of problems. Everything from coastal deforestation and coastal reclamation, declining water quality, pollution and sewage to destructive fishing and over-exploitation of marine life.
Coastal ecosystems are deteriorating badly and 40 percent of reefs and mangroves have already been lost during the past 40 years.
To make matters worse, climate change is beginning to take its toll.
“Changing weather patterns are causing floods, landslides and severe storms in some areas and crippling droughts in others,” according to the executive summary of a sobering WWF-commissioned study entitled The Coral Triangle And Climate Change: Ecosystems, People And Societies At Risk. The study investigated the conclusions of more than 300 published studies and consulted over 20 experts on various aspects of the Coral Triangle’s future.
The findings and conclusions of the study, written by top climate and coral expert Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg of the University of Queensland, were presented to the World Oceans Conference in Manado, Indonesia.
“Rising sea levels are putting pressure on coastal communities through storm surges and inundation of fresh water supplies,” the summary goes on.
Stark warning: The stark warning is that many parts of the Coral Triangle will be largely uninhabitable by the end of this century “under our present trajectory of unfettered growth in greenhouse gas emissions.”
Distinguished 19th century biologist Alfred Russel Wallace—one of the first people to recognise the global importance of the triangle’s biodiversity—was fascinated by the wealth of wildlife in the region.
Today, no fewer than four of the world’s 25 terrestrial biodiversity hotspots lie within the Triangle. “The Coral Triangle bubbles with life like an evolutionary cauldron.”
Coral reefs embrace 100,000 square kilometres of the Triangle—roughly one-third of the world’s total. Responsible for creating the calcium carbonate fabric of these reefs are the all-important reef-building corals.
It is estimated that coral reefs are home to anything between one and nine million species of plants and animals, many of them as yet unknown to science.
Mangrove forests and seagrass beds are “often under-appreciated components” of the Coral Triangle’s coastal ecosystems. They provide shelter for all manner of organisms, as well as resources vital to fisheries, coastal processes and people.
Many commercially important fish species spend some of their life within seagrass meadows and mangrove ecosystems.
Large animals like dugongs and sea turtles “are wholly dependent on the presence of healthy seagrass meadows for survival.”
The summary says the Coral Triangle’s proportion of global marine biodiversity is “nothing short of astounding,” for it boasts one third of all coral reefs and includes 11 distinct eco-regions and 32 functional seascapes.
Overall, the triangle harbours 605 reef-building corals (76 percent of the global total) and 52 percent of Indo-Pacific reef fishes (37 percent of the world’s reef species).
Molluscs, soft corals, crustaceans and many other types of organisms “have their highest concentration of biodiversity within the Coral Triangle.”
However, it is not only wildlife that is threatened by climate change and other environmental problems. Of the 150 million people who live inside the Coral Triangle, around 100 million are directly dependent on the resources of coastal ecosystems.
These systems, says the summary, are “crucial for human survival” in the region. Coastal ecosystems provide not only daily food and a means of earning a living for millions of people but also “a huge range of other services.”
Commercial fisheries are an important source of income for individuals and regional governments alike, while coral reefs serve as barriers to protect people, infrastructure and cities from wave and storm damage.
Mangroves and seagrass beds stabilise sediments and provide habitats for young fish and invertebrates.
Coastal ecosystems are especially important as filters, trapping sediments and nutrients and absorbing pollutants flowing into the sea.
“Together with coral reefs, these ecosystems are critically important to the stability and health of coastal environments.”
Deterioration of coastal ecosystems is often associated with poverty and hardship among people who live in and depend on them. When such ecosystems falter, people suffer.
Sometimes environmental changes lead to further poverty and may even force people to move to cities and towns “where they join already disenfranchised people in large, sprawling settlements. This breaks up families, disrupts communities and destroys cultures.”
Preserving the Coral Triangle is not, therefore, just about maintaining biodiversity but also about “securing the resources that allow tens of millions of people to live sustainably and continue to engage in vibrant local economies.”
Fisheries are a vital source of income in triangle countries, exports being worth more than US$9 million annually. Destruction of coastal ecosystems “will have dire consequences for fisheries”.
Tourism also depends heavily on coastal ecosystems in the form of clean beaches, clear water for swimming and healthy reef communities for boating, scuba diving and snorkelling.
The Philippines, which forms the apex of the Coral Triangle, includes “some of the most awe-inspiring marine environments on Earth, some of which have been compared to the Amazon rainforest or the Congo Basin in terms of their abundance of species,” says report author Professor Hoegh-Guldberg.
Food security threat: Among the wealth of wildlife in the Philippines are 330 freshwater and 2,995 marine and 330 freshwater fish species, from the fingernail-sized dwarf pygmy goby to the bus-sized whale shark.
“But at stake are more than just some of the most remarkable creatures and seascapes on the planet. Over 40 million Filipinos depend on the sea for food and livelihood, and the loss of these marine resources is a daunting food security threat.
“In one world scenario, we continue along our current climate trajectory and do little to protect coastal environments from the onslaught of local threats.
“Here, people see the biological treasures of the Philippines and the other Coral Triangle countries destroyed over the course of the century by rapid increases in ocean temperature, acidity and sea levels, while coastal habitat resilience declines under faltering coastal management.
“Poverty increases, food security plummets, economies suffer and more coastal people migrate to urban areas.”
In another scenario, the international community curbs the emission of greenhouse gases and Coral Triangle countries tackle environmental problems.
“This leads to a Coral Triangle climate scenario which is challenging but manageable and which responds well to regional action to reduce local environmental stresses from over-fishing, pollution and declining coastal water quality and health.”
WWF-International director general James Leape warned that even in the best case scenario, “communities will still face loss of coral, seal level rise, increased storm activity, severe droughts, saltwater intrusion and reduce food availability from coastal fisheries.
“A key difference, however, is that communities will remain reasonably intact and more resilient in the face of these hardships. Furthermore, there is a greater chance for environmental, economic and social recovery.”
In May last year, the presidents and prime ministers of the six Coral Triangle countries pledged to work together to try to solve the problems spotlighted in the WWF-commissioned report by adopting a 10-year regional plan of action to safeguard marine wildlife and ecosystems and secure the incomes, livelihoods and food supplies of the millions of people who live in the triangle.
Conservation International chairman and chief executive officer, Peter Seligmann said he had never seen anything like it in 30 years of conservation work—“six leaders signing a commitment to protect their marine resources for the well-being of their citizens and future generations.”
It must be hoped for everyone’s sake that actions really do speak louder than words.