Global contamination issues emerging in coastal regions : implications for the Red Sea ecosystem

Abstract EN

Coastal waters in tropical and sub-tropical regions of the world are among the most productive and intensely commercialized marine ecosystems, and are also the most threatened by contamination from industrial and urban land-use activities.

Insights into issues of potential importance for the Red Sea area may be obtained from experiences in analogous waters elsewhere in the world, including the western hemisphere.

Globally, the major challenges to a healthy coastal environment are posed by urbanization/industrial activity, intense coastal shipping, offshore petroleum exploitation, and tourism development.

Although the Red Sea is characterized by low population densities along its coasts, the need still exists for proper coastal zone management.

Urbanization and industrial activity are the major factor in pollution by metals in the vicinity of the city of Jeddah as well as by effluents from desalination plants and refineries.

Such urban-generated contamination almost always goes together with contamination by sewage and nutrients from waste water treatment.

All can have a negative effect on valued coastal amenities such as coral reefs, bathing beaches, coastal fisheries/mariculture, and coastal mangroves.

Research in Lake Ontario, Canada can be used to provide means to study the dispersal of such pollutants via sediments.

Ships using the Suez Canal carry cargoes (some of which are toxic or harmful to aquatic life) that pose a threat to coastal resources by accidental and deliberate spills/ discharges.

Research carried out elsewhere (the Bahamas) into the fouling of tourist beaches by petroleum tar-balls has shown that this effect is serious and cumulative and, in addition to sensitive coastal amenities (beaches, coral reefs, and fishing grounds), might also cause damage to valued benthic communities.

Ships traversing the Red Sea also have the potential for introducing exotic species from remote areas that may be harmful to the diverse Red Sea aquatic fauna, especially Acanthaster planci, the crown-of-thorns starfish.

This possibility is dramatically illustrated by the case of the inadvertent introduction of the European zebra mussel (Dreissena) to the Great Lakes in 1986