Regional Engagement
The need to engage the people to save the Reef
With the change in climate and other environmental factors affecting the Great Barrier Reefs, educating those in the area on how to protect the reefs and provide lasting solutions to the reefs against the constant threat from the climate would go a long way.
Building Reef Resilience Together
There are over one million people who reside in the reef watershed. This region is so vast, and it has been calculated to be around over 400,000 square kilometres of the catchment. This catchment spans across the region of Northern Cape York to Bundaberg.
People in this catchment area are agrarian in nature, and they are indigenous. It is as a result of this; there is a need for them to be properly educated and briefed on the need to create a reef’s resilience. This will not protect the endangered species; it will also serve as a means to protect the ecosystem.
Guiding Sustainable Reef Use
This regional engagement should be handled and carried out by experts who are knowledgeable in the various areas of protecting reefs against pressure which includes, the decrease in the quality of water, climatic change, how the coast can be developed to protect the Reef, how to properly manage the use of reefs.
This regional unit is also saddled with the responsibility of advising the people on how to maintain these sea bodies, and they must also see to it that the Reef is well protected. One way this has been carried out is by creating programmes that would educate the local people on how the Reef should be guarded.
Again, those who use the Reef as an avenue for recreational activities are also to be adequately educated on the activities to be carried. This would also help in making them understand the benefit of the Reef to the aquatic environment.
Again, people engaging in recreational activities are quite many; sometimes, they might be up to 5000 in number. This large number of people should also be enlightened and owing to the largeness of their number; they can be seen as stakeholders.
Also, Australia has a number of coastal recreational activities which deals with reefs. This program happens many times in the course of the year. As part of the regional engagement, during recreational activities, the protection of the Reef should be embedded as a part of the recreational programme. This would also make the recreational users be conscious of the need to protect the Reef whenever they are carrying out their activities.
In order to make regional engagement a sustainable one, the government of Australia should put in place policies that would also help the regional units. This would go a long way in protecting the Reef against misuse.
Again, people in the region must be able to follow the guidelines set out for them when carrying out their fishing activities. All these are for the safety of the aquatic and ecosystem.
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