Thursday, September 4, 2008

Sri Lanka/ Coral reefs

Sri Lanka faces much the same dilemmas as India : Tourism, coral collection, coral mining, and industrial and population growth all threaten its reefs, and since the country's population is increasing and gets about 65 percent of its animal protein from the ocean, reefs here are particularly prone to overfishing—meaning that if reefs are not managed better, famine could result from a fisheries collapse.
The government has been unable to halt traditional coral mining, and while it has established two marine reserves, Bar Reef and Hikkaduwa, it did not seem to work. Meanwhile, Hikkaduwa is being touristed to death, smothered in sand and sewage from beachfront hotel development; two-thirds of its coral cover is already gone.

See?

Source: Action Atlas

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