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10 | THE CORAL CHALLENGE

A GLOBAL INITIATIVE
The future of coral reefs

The International Coral Reef Initiative (ICRI) reveals its
initial conclusions from a widely anticipated report,

underlining the alarming condition of coral worldwide,
but also its resilience and reasons to be hopeful.

The ICRI’s leading coral reef experts held a digital mee-
ting on the afternoon of 25 March 2021. In his opening
address, H.E. Bernard Fautrier, special adviser to HSH
Prince Albert II of Monaco on the environment and co-
chair of the initiative, looked back at the history of the
ICRI, founded in 1994, which now has 90 members. It
is currently chaired by Monaco, Australia and Indone-
sia. They will soon be handing over the reins to the
United States, which has returned to the fray on ma-
jor environmental issues. “It is important”, underlined
H.E. Mr Bernard Fautrier, “to consider indications of
coral reef health on an international scale. And we are
delighted to see that nearly all our proposals will be
presented during the next Conference of the Parties
(COP) meeting on biological diversity, which will be
held in China this year”.

IN

FIGURES

World Coral Conservatory
■ 17 partner aquariums
■ 1,000 species expected

Coral reefs cover just 0.2% of the © CoralReefImageBank -Hannes Klostermann
world’s surface, but are home
to 1/4 of marine life.