Introduction
The Great Barrier Reef (GBR) stretches for more than 2000km (Bowen & Bowen, 2002). It consists of approximately 3000 individual reefs, covers an area of 345,000km2, and is the largest coral reef ecosystem in the world (De’Ath et al., 2012). The GBR was listed as a World Heritage area in 1981 because of its “outstanding universal value”, which met all four of the World Heritage natural criteria, which were:
“to contain superlative natural phenomena or areas of exceptional natural beauty and aesthetic importance;
“to be outstanding examples representing major stages of earth’s history, including the record of life, significant on-going geological processes in the development of landforms, or significant geomorphic or physiographic features; Read the rest of this entry »