Well-respected Indonesian Coral Expert Reveals The Current Health Index of Corals of Indonesia

The CTI-CFF Regional Secretariat (RS) with NCC Indonesia hosted a public lecture entitled ‘Health Index of Corals of Indonesia” presented by Prof. Dr. Suharsono, a well-respected Indonesian coral expert from the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) at the RS Headquarters Manado, Indonesia, Monday, 29 January 2018.

The coral reefs health Index is measured by the percentage of live coral cover, rubble, targeted fish biomass, fleshy seaweed as well as resilience potential. The scale of coral reefs health index ranges from 1 to 10, where the value of 1 is characterized, as "very bad" to the value of 10 is "very good".

Prof. Suharsono highlights some important key findings which are generated from 366 (three hundred sixty-six) monitoring posts located in 31 different locations across Western to Eastern parts of Indonesia for the period of 1993-2016 under the Coral Rehabilitation and Management Program Coral Triangle Initiative (COREMAP-CTI), which include:

1. The coral health index is needed to manage the coral reef and other related ecosystems.
2. In 2016, the status of the coral reefs condition in Western of Indonesia has the best coverage compared with Central and Eastern part of Indonesia.
3. The average of Coral reefs health index in Indonesia ranges from 3, 5, and 6. Nevertheless, there are 5 monitoring posts with the index of 10 (very good) and 14 monitoring posts with the index of 1 (very bad).

On the same occasion, Prof. Dr. Widi A. Pratikto, the Executive Director of CTI-CFF appealed to the other five Coral Triangle member countries to publish and socialize similar health index of corals (and these should be made available) – especially to the related authority stakeholders.

On behalf of LIPI, Prof. Suharsono also announced an opportunity for fellow scientists and related organizations across CT6 member countries to participate in a limited upcoming Regional Training on Reef Health Monitoring in October 2018. More information please visit www.lipi.go.id or email at humas@mail.lipi.go.id

Download the presentation here.

See gallery here.

Indonesian Sea Statistics