{"id":47278,"date":"2016-06-22T14:07:12","date_gmt":"2016-06-23T00:07:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=47278"},"modified":"2020-08-07T15:16:04","modified_gmt":"2020-08-08T01:16:04","slug":"coral-reef-experts-bridge-science-to-public-policy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2016\/06\/22\/coral-reef-experts-bridge-science-to-public-policy\/","title":{"rendered":"Coral reef experts bridge science to public policy"},"content":{"rendered":"<span class=\"span-reading-time rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Reading time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\"> 2<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minutes<\/span><\/span><div class=\"responsive-video-wrap\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"620\" height=\"349\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/aS8G1PX4qBs?rel=0&amp;showinfo=0\" title=\"Youtube video player\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>Experts say the world&#8217;s coral reefs are in severe decline. Coral bleaching reached historic levels over the last several years. This important ecological, economical and cultural resource is at risk.<\/p>\n<p>That is why about 2,500 delegates including three Pacific heads of state met in <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> in June for the 13th <a href=\"http:\/\/sgmeet.com\/icrs2016\/default.asp\">International Coral Reef Symposium<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p>The meeting&#8217;s convener, the University of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> at M&#257;noa&#8217;s director of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kewalo.hawaii.edu\/\">Kewalo Marine Laboratory<\/a> <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.kewalo.hawaii.edu\/index.php\/2013-08-02-03-42-22\/faculty\/robert-h-richmond\">Robert Richmond<\/a><\/strong> helped to bring the meeting to the state for the first time.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;The idea was to bring it to <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>, not only to showcase all that we have to offer but also as a wakeup call to the people of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>,&rdquo; said Richmond.<\/p>\n<p>According to Richmond, coral reefs are valued at $9.9 trillion dollars worldwide and 500 million people depend upon them for biodiversity, coastal protection, fisheries, medicine and tourism and recreation. The estimated value of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>&#8217;s reefs is $36 billion dollars with $360 million in annual revenue tied to them.<\/p>\n<p>The good news is that <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> is also rich in coral-reef related human resources. One of these is <a href=\"http:\/\/gatescorallab.com\/\"><strong>Ruth Gates<\/strong><\/a>, the director of <abbr title=\"Univerity of Hawaii\">UH<\/abbr> M&#257;noa&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/himb\/\"><span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> Institute of Marine Biology<\/a>, who is researching assisted evolution for corals and is the current president of the <a href=\"http:\/\/coralreefs.org\/\">International Society of Reef Studies<\/a>.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_47298\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-47298\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/manoa-coral-symposium-randall-j.jpg\" alt=\"John Randall sitting at table\" width=\"300\" height=\"302\" class=\"size-full wp-image-47298\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/manoa-coral-symposium-randall-j.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/manoa-coral-symposium-randall-j-130x130.jpg 130w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/manoa-coral-symposium-randall-j-258x260.jpg 258w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-47298\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Bishop Museum&#8217;s senior ichthyologist emeritus John Randall was presented the Darwin Medal, the International Society of Reef Studies&#8217; highest honor.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Gates helped to present the society&#8217;s highest honor, the Darwin Medal, to the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bishopmuseum.org\/\">Bishop Museum<\/a>&#8217;s senior ichthyologist emeritus <strong>John Randall<\/strong>, who earned his <abbr title=\"Doctor of Philosophy\">PhD<\/abbr> at <abbr>UH<\/abbr> M&#257;noa and has named more fish than anyone in the world over his distinguished career.<\/p>\n<p>Right now, the world&#8217;s reefs need all the help they can get from the scientific community and the 70 nations that were represented at the symposium.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;So we can&#8217;t sit around and just talk about it any more,&rdquo; said Richmond. &ldquo;It&#8217;s a real call to action not only from science to management, but from knowledge to action and that&#8217;s where the leaders are really helping to communicate with us about let&#8217;s stop talking about it and let&#8217;s start doing it.&ldquo;<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8212;By Kelli Trifonovitch<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The International Coral Reef Symposium brings researchers and policy makers together to preserve the ocean&#8217;s natural resources.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":47297,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26,12],"tags":[109,53,134,508,92,9,56],"class_list":["post-47278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","category-video","tag-coral-reefs","tag-hawaii-institute-of-marine-biology","tag-international","tag-kewalo-marine-laboratory","tag-school-of-ocean-and-earth-science-and-technology","tag-uh-manoa","tag-video-2","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/manoa-himb-coral-gates-f.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47278"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47278\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":124714,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47278\/revisions\/124714"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47297"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}