Marine Environment and Climate Change: Legal Aspects of Protection and Prevention Against Coral Reef Degradation in Indonesia

Coral reefs are one of the most important marine ecosystems, where fish and marine life breed. They also prevent coastal abrasion, and have economic value for the fishing industry, tourism and the environment. In the last ten years, there has been a crisis of coral reef damage due to the large number of irresponsible fishing activities that have become a trigger for global warming. Some of the symptoms that have begun to be seen around the world include rising sea levels, melting ice in the Arctic, changing storm directions and so on. Based on the data from the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI), it states that the condition of coral reefs in Indonesia has increased from year to year. Coral reefs in Indonesia have a damaged condition of around 25-35%. Damage to coral reefs is a threat to human life, and also is a threat to marine life. Based on the results of the World Ocean Conference (WOC) in Manado 2009 embodied in the Coral Triangle Initiative (CTI), obligations were established for countries with undersea ecosystems with biological natural resources to seek to conserve the coral reefs. The efforts that have been made by the government are in the form of the arrangement of laws and regulations which are effective and have legal certainty. Following the CTI, Indonesia has established regulations on coral reef protection based on international conventions and other regulations. The regulations are made as an effort to prevent, manage and conserve the coral reefs. The research method used in this paper was normative juridical, with a conceptual and statute approach.