Almost all shallow-water coral reefs now face extinction risk, study warns

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🗞️ Driving the news:The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has classified 96% of the world’s shallow-water coral reef systems as critically endangered, warning that these ecosystems face an extremely high risk of collapse over the next 50 years
• The assessment highlights the growing threat posed by climate change, rising ocean temperatures and increasingly damaging coral bleaching events

🔭 The context: The IUCN assessed 127 tropical and subtropical coral systems covering 188,362 square kilometres, using a climate scenario that projects global warming of 2.7°C above pre-industrial levels by 2100
• Major reef systems, including the Great Barrier Reef, the Coral Triangle, the Mesoamerican Barrier Reef and the Red Sea reefs, are among those classified as critically endangered
• When reefs collapse, hard corals can be replaced by algae, rubble and sponges, undermining marine biodiversity

🌍 Why it matters for the planet: Coral reefs support around a quarter of marine species and provide food, tourism income and coastal protection for communities worldwide
• Their decline threatens marine biodiversity, fisheries and livelihoods, while weakening natural defences against coastal erosion and storms

⏭️ What’s next: Reducing greenhouse gas emissions is crucial to limiting future ocean warming and bleaching
• The IUCN stresses that reefs are not yet lost: surviving, resilient coral populations may recover from severe bleaching, making conservation and efforts to improve their chances of survival increasingly urgent

💬 One quote:  “Coral reefs have shown a remarkable ability to bounce back from devastating bleaching events.”- Mishal Gudka, scientific lead of the IUCN Red List of Coral Reef Ecosystems assessment

📈 One stat: 96% — the share of the world’s coral reef systems classified as critically endangered in the IUCN assessment

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