A third of the world’s reef-building coral species are facing extinction. That is the stark conclusion from the first global study to assess the extinction risks of corals. Writing in the journal Science, researchers say climate change, coastal development, overfishing, and pollution are the major threats. The economic value of the world’s reefs has been estimated at over $30bn (£15bn) per year, through tourism, fisheries and coastal protection. ‘The picture is frightening,’ said Alex Rogers from the Zoological Society of London, one of 39 scientists involved in the assessment. ‘It’s not just the fact that something like a third of all reef-forming corals are threatened, but that we could be facing the loss of large areas of these ecosystems within 50 to 100 years. ‘The implications of that are absolutely staggering – not only for biodiversity, but also for economics.’ The analysis shows that reef-building corals are more threatened than any group of land-dwelling animals except amphibians. ‘Incredible’ destruction The most dramatic decline in recent years was caused by the 1997/8 El Nino event, which caused waters to warm across large swathes of the tropics. CORAL – KEY FINDINGS Known […]