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THE HEALTHY MESOAMERICAN REEF ECOSYSTEM INITIATIVE: AN OPPORTUNITY TO ENHANCE COLLABORATION AND APPLICATION OF ENVIRONMENTAL DATA

Melanie McField
Smithsonian Marine Station at Fort Pierce
Bio

The Healthy Mesoamerican Reef Ecosystem Initiative is a collaborative international initiative that generates user-friendly tools to measure the health of the Mesoamerican Reef (MAR) Ecosystem, and delivers scientifically credible reports to improve decision-making that effectively sustain social and ecosystem well-being. The Initiative is becoming recognized and respected as an independent and scientifically rigorous partnership that works to improve management decisions that affect the Mesoamerican Reef at the regional, national, and local level. The Healthy Reefs conceptual framework is built upon the fundamental elements of reef ecosystem structure (biodiversity, community structure, abiotics, habitat extent) and function (reproduction, herbivory, coral condition, reef accretion and bioerosion), while also integrating human stressors and social dimensions. Suites of indicators have been selected that measure these different components. Combinations of indicators can be evaluated to answer a wide variety of applied and basic research questions on multiple spatial scales. One example of using these indicators to answer practical management questions is the evaluation of impacts of the 2005 Bleaching event in Belize. Water temperatures surpassed 30ºC for much of the summer, resulting in a coral bleaching index of four degree heating weeks, the highest since 1998 (which reached an index of eight). Approximately 30-40% of the corals bleached but the passage of eight tropical storms intermittently contributed to lowering water temperatures and reducing the cumulative thermal stress. In summer 2006, we joined forces with TNC and WWF to carry out the largest reef assessment ever conducted in the MAR, involving over 330 sites (141 in Belize). The Belize survey assessed over 5,614 corals, finding minimal coral mortality (<1.5%) or disease (<2%). However, the mean coral cover remains low (about 10%) showing no signs of recovery from the recent declines. The partnership is now working to synthesize these and other indicators into an annual report card for the region.