Federal government commits $200M to reef recovery after bleaching event

The federal government has committed $200 million to a Great Barrier Reef Recovery Program following the fourth mass bleaching event in eight years, which affected an estimated 60 per cent of reef monitoring sites and prompted widespread concern about the long-term viability of the world's largest coral reef system under continued ocean warming conditions.

Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek announced the recovery package at a Cairns press conference alongside GBRMPA chief executive Josh Thomas, describing the commitment as the largest single reef investment in the government's history and noting that it would fund both immediate intervention programs — coral restoration, crown-of-thorns starfish control, and enhanced monitoring — and longer-term research into heat-tolerant coral varieties that could be deployed on priority reef sections.

The reef tourism industry in Cairns — which generates approximately $1.5 billion annually in economic activity and directly employs more than 6,000 people — has welcomed the investment as both an ecological necessity and a commercial protection for an industry whose entire product depends on the reef's health and appeal.

AIMS senior scientist Dr Line Bay said the recovery package would make a meaningful difference to the reef's resilience if deployed quickly and strategically, noting that the reef's recovery from bleaching events was faster and more complete in locations where the additional stressors — crown-of-thorns, poor water quality, physical damage from anchoring — were controlled during the warming events.

This article was compiled by AI from the sources linked above and screened before publishing. See our editorial standards.