The Great Barrier Reef

Water covers 70% of the world’s surface. Coral reefs only cover 1% of the ocean floor, yet they hold more than 25% of all marine life. They are considered the forests of the seas and are very important. But human activities have greatly impacted on coral reefs around the world. They must be used sustainably and taken care of so that our children and their children after them can use and enjoy them.

Coral Reefs are important, not just to the environment, but to humans as well. Currently, around 500 million people rely on coral reefs for their livelihood, source of food or a means of protecting their homes. Coral reefs absorb some of the kinetic energy from waves, reducing their power as they hit the shoreline. This decreases coastal erosion.
They are seriously endangered and many have been disappearing from around the globe. 27% of the world’s coral reefs have already vanished. The Great Barrier Reef has experienced a 50% decline in coral over the last 27 years. Irrigation has caused the water quality decline to decline, causing the decrease in size of the reef. The Great Barrier Reef has experienced mass bleaching, once in 1988 and the other time in 2002. In 1998, around 50% of all of the coral was bleached and 5% were severely damaged. At this point, sea temperatures on the Great Barrier Reef were the highest ever recorded. In 2002, 60% of the coral were bleached with 5% damaged. Bleaching is caused by an increase in water temperatures. As shown in Figure 2, bleaching is having a serious effect on the Great Barrier Reef. Pollution from farms is one of the major problems affecting the reef. Fertilisers, insecticide and other chemicals that run off from farms smother the sea grass meadows preventing sunlight. They also encourage Crown-of-thorns starfish outbreaks and make coral more susceptible to bleaching. Crown-of-thorns starfish destroy coral with their
Many countries and organisations around the world are making efforts to save the corals. For example, The NOAA, which stands for National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, has a conservation program for the coral reefs of the U.S. They monitor coral reefs and collect data to evaluate the condition of the reefs. The NOAA program also funds the development of early warning products on various impacts, including oceanographic conditions, coral bleaching, and disease, runoff and other threats. They try to reduce land-based runoff into oceans that could potentially harm the reef. Australia should use other countries as role models and help protect the Great Barrier