Mapping the global value and distribution of coral reef tourism

Global coral reef related tourism is one of the most significant examples of nature-based tourism from a single ecosystem. Coral reefs attract foreign and domestic visitors and generate revenues, including foreign exchange earnings, in over 100 countries and territories. Understanding the full value of coral reefs to tourism, and the spatial distribution of these values, provides an important incentive for sustainable reef management. In the current work, global data from multiple sources, including social media and crowd-sourced datasets, were used to estimate and map two distinct components of reef value. The first component is local "reef-adjacent" value, an overarching term used to capture a range of…

• GA
  Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation
• LH
  Lyda Hill Foundation
• NC
  Nature Conservancy