The Trouble with our Ocean
Herman Cesar
herman.cesar at ivm.vu.nl
Sat Nov 18 07:56:16 EST 2000
Reply to Peter and Ove on the economics of live versus dead reefs
In my view, the Pacific could lose a lot in terms of a decline in coastal
tourism from mass coral mortality. This is for three reasons. First, because
the Pacific could not easily replace its diver niche market for another market
segment due to its remoteness from the main rich population centres in the
world. Secondly, because fish diversity could decline in the long run due to
dead reefs. Thirdly, if dead reefs lead, through bio-erosion, to coastal
erosion, sandy beaches might be washed away in the long run. There is more
scientific evidence for the first issue. For the other two issues, it is too
soon to tell.
There are a coule of issues here. First, I think Peter is right that some dead
reefs attract as many tourists as live reefs. We saw this in a recent study in
the Maldives where we surveyed tourists post-bleaching and we showed them
pictures of dead and live reefs and many thought that the photos with dead
corals and lots of fish were live reefs. Also, tourism figures was not
affected in any major way after 90% of the corals had died in the 1998
bleaching event (see Westmacott et al (2000)). Yet, in El Nido, the
Philippines, we found a clear decline in dive tourism, after bleaching, a
hurricane, destructive fishing and general overfishing had made the area less
fascinating for divers. Yet, this loss in dive tourism was partly offset with
an increase in Korean/Japanese honeymoon tourism to the area, showing that the
tourism industry is rather flexible in some areas (see Cesar, 2000). Moreover,
in areas in Eastern Africa, however, where tourism is already declining and
tourist substitution possibilities are low, bleaching would have a more
pronounced impact on the tourism industry (Westmacott et al., 2000). In the
Pacific, where substitution possibilities are also more limited than in the
Maldives, I believe that tourism could therefore lose a lot from mass coral
mortality. This was the basis for our prediction in the latest Greenpeace
report with socio-economic estimates in Hoegh-Goldberg et al. (2000) that
tourism was likely to decrease significantly if bleaching were to become an
annual phenomenon.
With respect to long run fisheries and coastal erosion predictions, I am very
interested to learn from others what the thoughts are. Data from both the
Philippines and Kenya after bleaching suggest that underwater fish counts and
fishery has not declined significantly due to the 1998 bleaching event yet.
(for a summary, see Hoegh-Goldberg et al. 2000).
Literature:
Westmacott, S., H. Cesar, L. Pet-Soede & O. Lindén (2000), "Coral Bleaching in
the Indian Ocean: Socio-Economic Assessment of Effects", in H. Cesar (ed.)
"Collected Essays on the Economics of Coral Reefs", CORDIO, Kalmar University,
Kalmar, Sweden.
Hoegh-Goldberg, O., H. Hoegh-Goldberg, D.K. Stout, H. Cesar and A. Timmermann
(2000), "Pacific in Peril - Biological, Economic and Social Impacts of Climate
Change on Pacific Coral Reefs", Greenpeace Australia/Pacific, Sidney.
Cesar, H. (2000), "Economic Valuation of the Impacts of Coral Bleaching on
Tourism in El Nido, the Philippines", report prepared for USAID, Cesar
Environmental Economics Consulting, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
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