Climate Change Strategy and Implementation Plan, 2014-2016
Eddie Reef near Mission Beach, Queensland
Photo Credit: C. Mark Eakin, NOAA Coral Reef Watch
The Climate Change Strategy and Implementation Plan refines and builds upon the Coral Reef Conservation Program Goals and Objectives 2010-2015 to direct Program investments in reducing the impacts of climate change and ocean acidification to coral reef ecosystems.
Priority actions include:
Support reef managers in evaluating and understanding the vulnerability and resilience of their reefs and dependent communities and in using this information to inform management decisions.
Develop, refine and disseminate climate products and services to our management partners, meeting their unique timing, format and content requirements and use this information for decision-making.
Build the capacity to of managers to integrate science and local knowledge into management and raise awareness about climate change impacts and the benefits and potential for sound ecosystem-based management.
The Coral Program’s approach, partnerships, and past accomplishments lay the foundation for this pathway forward. The focus of the Coral Program is to support effective ecosystem-based management and adaptation with a foundation of sound science to understand the impacts of climate change and ocean acidification to coral reef ecosystems. Based on this information, the Program provides targeted tools, products, and services to inform on-the-ground management of coral reef ecosystems.
Climate change and ocean acidification will continue to present greater and greater challenges for coral reef managers, stakeholders, and our partners. This will require a certain agility and responsiveness to emerging issues and the opportunities they present, whether those are related to policy or extreme events. This document will be used by the Program to craft our internal requests for proposals, external federal funding opportunities, and in the evaluation of the proposals that we receive. We hope that our partners will use it to better understand our priorities as we work together to tackle the challenge climate change and ocean acidification present to coral reef conservation and management.
