Does the pet trade really impact ocean environments?
Growing coastal communities increase the amount of sewage and waste production that might affect sensitive reef cultures. Development that supports those human populations, such as logging, farming, and dredging, can increase the amounts of silt in the water that can block out light and smother corals. Tourism that promotes water-oriented activities such as snorkeling, diving, and underwater photography can lend itself to destruction of the very resource that attracts people through their unintentional carelessness. Even global climate change and the resulting increase in intensity of ultraviolet rays plays havoc with the health of coral reefs and the multitude of living things that rely on them. With a situation this complex, the aquarium trade is clearly not the only culprit in the degradation of ocean environments. In fact, even though over 1.5 million kilograms of coral are harvested each year worldwide, not all coral harvested goes into the aquarium trade. Most is used for constru
