Regional Decline of Coral Cover in the Indo-Pacific: Timing, Extent, and Subregional Comparisons

BACKGROUND: A number of factors have recently caused mass coral mortality events in all of the world's tropical oceans. However, little is known about the timing, rate or spatial variability of the loss of reef-building corals, especially in the Indo-Pacific, which contains 75% of the world's coral reefs. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPLE FINDINGS: We compiled and analyzed a coral cover database of 6001 quantitative surveys of 2667 Indo-Pacific coral reefs performed between 1968 and 2004. Surveys conducted during 2003 indicated that coral cover averaged only 22.1% (95% CI: 20.7, 23.4) and just 7 of 390 reefs surveyed that year had coral cover >60%. Estimated yearly coral cover loss based on annually pooled survey data was…

• NS
  National Science Foundation

  Award: 0326983
• AI
  Australian Institute of Marine Science
• GB
  Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority
• NC
  Nature Conservancy
• WR
  World Resources Institute
• NO
  National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
• UO
  University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill