Australia unveiled plans to pump hundreds of millions of dollars into a project to protect the climate-ravaged Great Barrier Reef on Friday, hoping to prevent the vast network of corals from being removed from UNESCO's World Heritage list, SİA reports citing AFP.
Conservative prime minister Scott Morrison announced the Aus$1 billion (US$700 million) nine-year plan, months after narrowly avoiding the reef being placed on UNESCO's "in danger" list.
"We are backing the health of the reef and the economic future of tourism operators, hospitality providers and Queensland communities that are at the heart of the reef economy," Morrison said.
The move, welcomed by Paris-based UNESCO, comes ahead of a general election expected in May, when Morrison will have to win key Queensland seats near the reef to remain in power.
When the U.N. previously threatened to downgrade the reef's World Heritage listing in 2015, Australia created a "Reef 2050" plan and poured billions of dollars into protection.
The measures are believed to have arrested the pace of decline, but much of the world's largest reef system has already been damaged.
A recent study found bleaching had affected 98% of the reef since 1998, leaving just a fraction untouched.
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