Sixteenth USCRTF Meeting -- St.
Thomas, Virgin Islands
General:
The U.S.
Coral Reef Task Force held a public meeting in St. Thomas,
U.S. Virgin
Islands October 24 – 28, 2006. The purpose of the meeting was to
learn about and take action on key issues related to coral reef conservation in
the Caribbean. The Task Force heard from
leading experts on coral diseases, coral bleaching, the
state of domestic and international coral reef ecosystems. Several updates were given as well as several
workshops I had the pleasure to attend. Workshops included where: Tools for
Responding to Injury Events in Coral Reefs; Acropora
Management Update; USVI Coral Management Issues; Sustainable Tourism; A Reef
Manager’s Guide to Bleaching; TNC Caribbean Decision Support System; International
Year of the Reef; and Grant Writing Skills. Given that a lot of the workshops
where held concurrent with other sessions and the time I left on Saturday I was
only able to attend 3 out of the 8 listed.
A summary of each workshop can be found at www.coralreef.gov. .The Task
Force discussed and acted on eleven key which will be discussed later on as
well as what was discussed in the workshops.
Of particular importance this
meeting was the report on
coral disease and the status of the reefs. There is so little
true understanding or scientific capacity to understand the factors involved. The Coral Disease and Health consortium was
asked to develop and coordinate strategies to address coral disease issues and
serve as the official Coral Disease Working Group for the Task Force.
IYOR:
Alissa
Barron, NOAA, provided an update on the International Year of the Reef (IYOR).
The primary goal of the IYOR is to raise global awareness of the value of coral
reefs and the challenges they face. Key Events in 2008 include: U.S. and Mexico
will serve as co-chairs of ICRI Secretariat from 2007 to 2009; 10th
Anniversaries of the establishment of the Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network,
Reef Check network, and the U.S. Coral Reef Task Force; International Coral
Reef Symposium (ICRS) is planned for July 2008; Global and U.S. ‘State of Reef’
reports will be released; and the Smithsonian Oceans Hall Coral Reef Exhibit
will open. During the side meeting on October 26th at 7:30pm where
we met for several hours we discussed how best to handle the IYOR and who would
have control. It was decided that just as the first IYOR that no one
organization would have control and that each jurisdiction would hold its own
events with centralized exchange of data to coordinate everything. The
discussions are ongoing and all 30 or so members who showed up are on the IYOR
email list which will continue to discuss and support IYOR and I will continue
to interact with this group to support this process. I would suggest that MASNA
coordinate our MACNA conference to include special IYOR notability for 2008 and
hopefully tieing in with 2008 IYOR will also increase
our conference and notoriety in the global community.
US. Virgin Islands
Status:
The
Workshop on the status of the Virgin Islands Reefs brought about a lot of key
aspects and difficulties they face. Objectives of this workshop where to
discuss in a solution oriented the state of USVI
about the state of USVI coral reef ecosystems and foster on ecological and
management issues facing Caribbean coral reef
ecosystems. The discussed how current management strategies are insufficient
and there is a great disconnect between managers and scientists and a basic
insufficient understanding of economic value of reefs. There is an inability to
get appropriate messages out to stakeholders and a need for consistent and meaningful
stakeholder engagement and a need to engage non-traditional stakeholders.
Management changes every 4 years and with that sacrificies
continuity and risks abandoning processes that work. There is a need for funded
positions to overview the projects and continuity.
Sustainable Tourism:
There workshop
highlighted the challenges faced with the tourism that is of great financial
need for the area and ways to achieve sustainable tourism. Of the destructive factors
which continue to happen are untrained divers, coastal development, and demand
for seafood to name a few. These practices lead to pollution and loss of reef
environments through development and damage from divers as well as over fishing.
Some key issues discussed to help curb this are through management, education,
monitoring and repopulation of fish species in the area. Talk was given into getting
everyone involved to understand the issues and challenges and work together to
obtain sustainable tourism. In an effort for sustainable tourism there have
been blue flag beaches opened in the Dominican
Republic, Puerto Rico, Jamaica and the Bahamas
with Puerto Rico holding the lead there in
number of beaches. For more information on the blue flag program you can read
about it here. http://www.blueflag.org.
Setting aside lots of Marine Protected Areas for protection as well as programs
like blue flag and education play key in getting everyone involved to have
sustainable tourism.
USCRTF Meeting:
An Overview 2005 Caribbean coral
bleaching report by Caroline Rogers was given in more detail than previously
reported now that there has been a year of research since the event. A major coral bleaching event occurred in the
Caribbean in mid- to late-2005, which resulted
in the loss of 35% of coral in much of the region, and corals are continuing to
decline. A lot of talk was given that there is a real need for a well-designed
monitoring program in place before events
takes place and increased monitoring frequency. Billy Causey and Andrew Skeat
presented “A Reef Manager’s Guide to Coral Bleaching.” The Reef Manager's Guide
provides information on the causes and consequences of coral bleaching,
management strategies to help local and regional reef managers reduce this threat
and case studies from a variety of coral reef ecosystems. Mark Eakin described
the potential impacts of ocean acidification on coral reefs. Conclusions
include that ocean acidification is a growing problem and it will be
significant for reef corals within a few decades. This brings into the most important aspect
and report given in my opinion this meeting. There was a report given in great
detail which had people all across the conference spell bound and was probably
the key event. Jeremy Jackson gave a report on the changing environment in the Caribbean
Reef Ecosystem and it details changes that are bring about the destruction of
the reefs of the world. It draws upon historical data and observations going
back hundreds of years. It is the first time I have heard open discussion on
how the global warming of our planet for one is bring about catastrophic
destruction which is not openly discussed. The report detailed very clearly the
temperature changes and ocean acidification changes as well as changes in the
food web which all together are bringing about the destructive changes we are seeing
now. We all know as good reef keepers that corals are unable to produce there
exoskeletons in a more acidic environment. Temperature changes bring death and
disease. The loss of bigger fish and creatures such as sea turtles which use to
roam free throughout the reef and are now vacant lead to shifts in the food
chain which in turn along with the pollution help contribute to algal blooms.
The checks and balances that are in place that keep our precious reef
ecosystems alive are being systematically destroyed by man. There was a lot of
talk also if there will be positive effects great enough to save the reefs for
our children. There has to be some drastic changes done to pollution, global
warming, the resulting acidification as well as over fishing which is destroying
the food web if we are to reverse the effects we see now.
The Task Force held a moderated panel
on the status of the coral reefs in the Caribbean.
The presenters gave updates on coral reef issues and ways to improve
opportunities in Florida, the U.S. Virgin
Islands, and Puerto Rico. Discussion followed
with a group of eight expert panelists focused on the importance of cooperative
conservation initiatives. Difference based approaches, highlighting the
importance of coral ecosystems to tourist driven industries are in the Caribbean are essential for the economy of many cultures.
Puerto Rico has opened its blue flag beach program which has been around some
time in Europe. It is an effort to keep its
beaches clean for future enjoyment and ways to limit pollution to the
environment. The group agreed that there is a great need to communicate about
the threats to coral reefs and opportunities for conservation globally. The
group emphasized the need to strengthen enforcement activities. The Task Force
suggested revisiting this topic at the next meeting, with a special focus on
how to bring market-based solutions to coral reef conservation.
The following decision items were passed
by the USCRTF at the end of the meeting
• Establish a new Working Group on Cooperative
Conservation to help build public-private partnerships for coral reef
conservation.
• Participate in preparing a report “The State of coral
Reef Ecosystems of the United
States and Freely Associated States.”
• Endorse plans to complete a progress report on
Implementation of the U.S. National coral Reef Action Strategy 2004-2006.
• Support planning and implementation of the 2008
International year of the Reef.
• Support planning and implementation of the 2008
International Coral Reef Symposium.
• Request that the Coral Disease and Health Consortium
develop and coordinate strategies to address coral disease issues.
• Establish a new working group to coordinate actions
regarding tools for responding to major injury events to coral reef habitat.
• Support development and implementation of response
plans to coral bleaching.
• Support recommendations from the Status of USVI Coral
Reef Ecosystem Workshop.
As always this is
just a summary of the week at glance from all the information I collected while
attending the various events. So much more went on but these are what I
considered the important aspects of the meeting. Please feel free to read full
transcripts of any event at http://coralreef.gov
Sincerely,
Chuck Scannell
MASNA
Industry Rep.
