HALIFAX, Canada (Dec 2006) — The Philippine Islands, located in
the Southeast Asian marine biodiversity triangle, has the richest
concentration of marine life on the entire planet, according to a
study conducted by Kent Carpenter, Old Dominion University associate
professor of biological sciences in Virginia, USA.

A multidisciplinary project headed by Carpenter that lasted more
than 10 years and involved 101 of the world’s foremost authorities
on marine life produced 2,983 maps of marine species for the western
Pacific Ocean. The study, conducted for the Food and Agriculture
Organization of the United Nations, produced “the largest and most
accurate database available” according to a review by Bruce Collette
of the National Marine Fisheries Service Systematic Laboratory at
the Smithsonian Institution.

“Scientists have long known that the area in Southeast Asia that
includes Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines hold the richest
marine biodiversity. I was amazed to discover that the extreme
center of this biodiversity is in the Philippines, rather than
closer to the equator,” said Carpenter. “However, a geographical
information system analysis of this extensive database clearly shows
this pattern.”

The results of these findings are published in the journal
Environmental Biology of Fishes under the title, “The Center of the
Center of Marine Shorefish Biodiversity: The Philippine Islands.”
The article is coauthored by Victor Springer of the National Museum
of Natural History in Washington, D.C. The computer analysis was
done with the support of Conservation International.

Carpenter’s goal now is to understand the natural forces, such as
lithospheric plate movements, prevailing currents and the geography
and geology of the area that contributed to the evolution of the
biodiversity.

“This discovery poses some very interesting questions about the
origins of marine life in our oceans. Perhaps the Philippines holds
the key to unraveling mysteries about how marine biodiversity
patterns change through space and time,” said Carpenter.

Another of Carpenter’s goals is to support conservation efforts in
the Philippines. Teeming with life on its coral reefs, mangrove
swamps, seagrass beds and soft-bottom habitats, the Philippine
Islands are the marine counterpart to the Amazon rainforest in terms
of concentrated biodiversity, he said. Unfortunately, the
Philippines shares another sad common characteristic with the Amazon—
many of its inhabitants are being threatened with local extinction
due to uncontrolled deforestation, soil erosion, air and water
pollution, coral reef degradation and destructive fishing techniques.

The study also found that this center of marine biodiversity has a
comparatively high number of species that are only found in the
Philippines. Therefore, there is the real threat of extinction,
including some species that have yet to be discovered by scientists.

“This area is highly threatened and a number of destructive fishing
practices, including dynamite fishing, contribute to the decline,”
said Carpenter. “One of the biggest threats to coral reefs is in
runoff from poor land use that results in heightened erosion. This
runoff goes into the rivers and out to sea covering the coral in
sediments that are detrimental to their survival.”

Species Carpenter helped catalogue in the waters off of the
Philippine Islands include seaweeds, corals, bivalves, gastopods,
cephalopods, stomatopods, shrimps, lobsters, crabs, sea cucumbers,
sharks, rays, chimaeras, bony fishes, estuarine crocodiles, sea
turtles, sea snakes and marine mammals.

“Biodiversity is of major interest to many people,” he said. “The
livelihood of many Filipinos depends on the health of their marine
ecosystem. There is a big dilemma however, in that the use of this
valuable resource is often at odds with its conservation, and
without conservation the resource will soon loose its value.
Filipinos are trying valiantly to resolve this. However, clearly,
much work still needs to be done to solve this dilemma.”

Based on Carpenter’s findings, one of the most important places to
focus attention on conservation is in the waters off of the
Philippine Islands.

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