World asked to help save Indonesia's coral reefs

World asked to help save Indonesia's coral reefs

NUSA DUA, Bali (JP): Vice President Megawati Soekarnoputri
called on the international community on Wednesday to help save
the nation's coral reefs through concrete but nonbinding
assistance.

"Paying close attention to international developments lately,
particularly with regard to the increasing tendency for
politicking among international organizations, I fervently hope
that the International Societies for Reef Studies (ISRS) will
stick to their professional areas of competence," Megawati said
in her address to some 1,500 of the world's marine scientists and
other guests at the ninth International Symposium on Coral Reefs
here.

Megawati said that although the country's maritime area of
some 5.8 million square kilometers is home to around 65,000
square kilometers of coral reefs, or one-eighth of all the
world's coral reefs, only about 6.5 percent of them are still in
good condition while the rest have been damaged.

"Of course, we are responsible for this. But I do hope that we
can arrange cooperation to cope with the problem.

"I said "cooperation" rather than "aid" as the connotations
and mechanisms of the latter have been altered," she asserted.

Megawati further noted that concrete measures and responses
to the problems of coral reefs are far more important than new
regulations or norms.

"Cooperation in the form of joint research, dissemination of
knowledge and expertise, exchange of experiences, and the
provision of guidance and assistance for experts implementing
particular programs will provide a concrete solution to the
problem," she said.

Megawati also urged members of international coral reef
societies to ensure that the symposium will not rest with the
formulation of recommendations alone.

"This meeting should substantively come up with new techniques
and methods for rehabilitating coral reefs and effectively
sharing these with interested and related parties," she said.

"The last three years have been difficult for us, especially
with the impact of the economic crisis and the fact that we have
simultaneously had to resolve various social and political
upheavals in certain regions that have led to a great deal of
material and human losses and threats to our nation's unity.

"This crisis has also hit the environmental management sector
and we will have to quickly remedy this."

Earlier on the second day of the symposium, a Global Report on
the Status of Coral Reefs was made public.

Predictions had been made in 1992 that over the subsequent 10
to 20 years another 30 percent of the world's coral reefs could
be effectively destroyed if urgent management actions were not
implemented.

Sea erosion

Separately, an investigator from the Environmental Impact
Management Agency (Bapedal), R. Bambang Pramudyanto, revealed
that the destruction of coral reefs had led to massive sea
erosion, such as was happening along the north coast of Java.

"Other contributing factors to sea erosion are the drastic
destruction of mangrove forest as well as reclamation and river
course realignment, all of which alter sea current patterns."

Bambang further noted the alarming fact that some 2,140
hectares of beach had been severely eroded in Indramayu, West
Java.

"Tegal (in Central Java) has lost some 125 hectares of its
beaches due to erosion while in Semarang (the province's
capital), some 200 hectares of beach have been eroded," Bambang
said.

State-owned oil company Pertamina has been forced to relocate
its refinery pipes several times in these areas due to sea
erosion. (edt)