Credit: ASU Global Airborne Observatory
With a group of core partners, Arizona State University is creating a new $25 million collaboration to preserve and restore vitality to Hawaiʻi’s coral reefs and the health of its coastlines. Corals are critical to reef biodiversity and home to millions of marine species. Where corals flourish, land and sea are usually well stewarded. But over the past 50 years, Hawaiian coral communities have undergone an alarming decline due to pollution, climate change and overfishing. The new community-based effort looks to fuse state-of-the-art science programs with the leadership and cultural knowledge of Hawaiʻi’s community partners to enable coastal and reef sustainability for generations to come. Named ʻĀkoʻakoʻa (pronounced ah kō-a kō-a), the effort shares a dual meaning ʻto assemble’ and ‘coral.’