This Indo-Pacific region is home to the highest diversity of coral species on Earth and includes tropical waters surrounding the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Timor-Leste and the Solomon Islands. The Coral Triangle is a natural treasure and is widely considered the “Amazon of the Seas". It also provides habitat for the “living fossil” coelacanth and six out of the seven species of sea turtles! More than 120 million people call the Coral Triangle home and depend on its reef ecosystem for food, their livelihoods and storm protection. Threats to marine life in this region include climate change, ocean acidification, overfishing and harmful fishing practices like dynamite fishing, and runoff from coastal development and agriculture, but there is a bright future ahead: six countries have joined together with the goal of establishing a Coral Triangle Marine Protected Area System (CTMPAS).
