Australia will oppose a UNESCO plan to include the Great Barrier Reef on the list of world heritage in danger due to deterioration caused by climate change, the government announced Tuesday.
UNESCO published this Monday a preliminary report in which it recommends degrading the status of the Great Barrier Reef, included in the world heritage since 1981, due to its deterioration, largely due to the bleaching episodes of the corals, a consequence of the climatic disorders.
“It is a warning to the international community and humanity that the coral ecosystem is in danger,” Fanny Douvere, head of UNESCO’s World Heritage marine program, told reporters.
For environmental organizations, this recommendation highlights the government’s unwillingness to reduce carbon emissions.
A month before the next session of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee, scheduled in July in China, the Australian government warned that it will challenge this project and expressed “strong disappointment” with that body.
“I agree that global climate change is the greatest threat to the world’s reefs, but it is wrong, in our opinion, to designate the world’s best-managed reef for a list (of sites) ‘in danger’,” the Australian Environment Minister Susan Ley.
He also reproached UNESCO for not taking into account the billions of dollars spent trying to protect the 2,300-kilometer-long Barrier located in the northeast of the country.
“It sends the wrong signal to those countries that are not making the investments that we are making in protecting coral reefs,” he said.
In addition to the Great Barrier, UNESCO proposed to include six other sites in the status ‘in danger’, among them the Italian city of Venice, hit by tourist overcrowding.
He also proposed removing from the world heritage list the promenade in the English city of Liverpool, threatened by various development projects, and the Selous Nature Reserve in Tanzania, harassed by poachers.
Disappearance of half the corals
In addition to its inestimable value from a natural or scientific point of view, the reef is considered to generate $ 4.8 billion in revenue for the Australian tourism industry.
The preliminary report highlights Australia’s efforts, especially financial ones, but regrets “that the long-term outlook for the ecosystem has deteriorated further, from mediocre to very mediocre.”
Since 1995, half of the corals in the Great Barrier Reef have disappeared due to rising water temperatures.
In addition, in the last five years, there have been three bleaching episodes, a phenomenon also caused by the heating of the water that weakens the corals and produces their bleaching.
Inclusion on the list of endangered sites is not considered a sanction by UNESCO. Some countries even see it as a way to raise awareness in the international community and to contribute to the safeguarding of heritage.
“The Australian government cannot save the Great Barrier Reef on its own,” said Fanny Douvere, who urged improving water quality to increase the coral’s resistance to climate change.
Fear of inevitable destruction
The environmental organizations have launched themselves against the Australian government, which has yet to set a carbon neutrality target for 2050.
Conservative Prime Minister Scott Morrison said he hoped to achieve it “as soon as possible” without endangering jobs and businesses in the country, one of the world’s largest importers of coal and natural gas.
The UNESCO recommendation shows “clearly and unequivocally that the Australian government is not doing enough to protect our greatest natural asset, especially against climate change,” said Richard Leck, WWF’s director of oceans.
For Imogen Zethoven, consultant to the Australian Marine Conservation Society, this preliminary report highlights the importance of limiting global warming to +1.5 ° C to safeguard this gem.
She estimates that the climatic data recorded in Australia correspond rather to a temperature increase of 2.5 to 3 ° C, a level that would “inevitably” lead to the “destruction of the Great Reef and of all the coral reefs of the world”.
