Ecotourism Amid a Bleaching Calamity in The Great Barrier Reef

23.04.2024 - 07:55 / skift.com / Travel Experiences / Jesse ChaseLubitz

The Great Barrier Reef is in the midst of its worst mass bleaching event on record — a process in which warmer-than-usual water causes corals to expel their algae and turn white. Corals can survive a bleaching event, but it puts them under stress and makes them more susceptible to dying.

The tourism sector in the Great Barrier Reef has a long history of trying to lessen the harms of human impact. And in recent years, it has found that tourists can help.

The Reef brings more than 2 million tourists to the northeast coast of Queensland, Australia every year and it provides 60,000 jobs. The reef ecosystem boasts 400 types of coral, 1,500 species of fish, rare whale species and six of the world’s seven marine turtle species. It was designated a World Heritage site in 1981. However, the experience has been changing as the climate warms. 

UNESCO, the UN body that oversees World Heritage sites, suggested in 2021 that the site be added to its “In Danger” list. It avoided that designation but will be evaluated again in the second half of 2024.

Tourism in the Great Barrier Reef has been conservation-focused for decades — the industry is closely regulated, caps are put on locations and tour operators, and in the past few years, tour operators have increasingly shifted their focus to educating a concerned audience about how climate change is impacting the reef. 

“There have always been really conscious travelers,” said Mark Olsen, CEO of Tourism Tropical North Queensland, a non-governmental organization in Cairns, Australia. “But I think we’ve finally hit a mainstream audience, particularly travelers in their 20s and 30s who have grown up in a climate crisis and who understand that the natural world is under stress from human-induced effects.” 

Passions of Paradise is among a handful of operators that offer a science tour in which tourists can dive and help monitor coral health and nurseries. Other groups have glass bottom boats that show tourists where the reef is struggling, where corals have been relocated to help them thrive, and where life is still vibrant. 

One company, Reef Magic, offers visitors the chance to help replant corals outside the water. Replanting coral fragments is a highly regulated process, so most companies don’t have approval to let non-experts partake. 

But Olsen says that the industry is seeing a demand for tourists who want to help, and they’re working to respond by offering hands-on activities. 

Beyond tour activities, tour operators are crucial to the monitoring of the coral reef. Twenty-six tour operators are engaged in an initiative in which they provide surveys to the government. Between 2023 and 2024, they provided almost 3,500 reef health surveys to the government.

“There has