An Essay On Coral Bleaching

CORAL BLEACHING

We all remember corals as beautiful multi colored rock like animals known for the marine diversity they boast. Coral bleaching is exactly what the names suggests which is the whitening and bleaching-out of the coral reefs. Now the question is how it happens. For that to understand we need to know what is coral reefs made up of and from where they get their beautiful colors.

Corals allow tiny algae to live inside its tissues where they live in harmony with coral animals and thereby share resources. These algae provide the corals with their beautiful colors and also the food through carbohydrates they produce during photosynthesis. Now corals function normally within a certain temperature. Coral bleaching occurs when the seat water temperature rises too much which makes these corals get stressed out and their relationship with algae becomes sour. This makes the algae to eject out of corals, turning them white. The problem arises is when these algae are not reabsorbed by the corals in the near term, they get starved of food and hence die. So now we can generalize coral bleaching was when corals

Results from previous researches on coral bleaching’s impact on businesses are jaw dropping. Some examples are, Zanzibar in Tanzania reported US$3 – 4.6 million direct losses and US$13 – 20 million loses were reported in Mombasa, Kenya with total welfare losses of US$1.88 – 2.82 million and 10.06 – 15.09 million, respectively. In Maldives and Sri Lanka, direct financial losses of US$3 million and US$.02 million with corresponding losses in total welfare of US$ 19 million and 2.2 million were reported respectively. In a study, the cost of losing 58% of world’s coral reefs has been estimated at $US90 billion in lost tourism alone in 1998 and this is just the direct cost. If we add the indirect cost to it, the amount is staggering and many industries run the risk of walking on thin