By Mandy Lee

The Department of Marine Parks Kedah recently issued the order for partial closure of Pulau Payar Marine Parks with effect from 20 June 2010 and for all activities to be suspended at two main areas within the Park. These are the Marine Park Centre House Reef and at Coral Garden, both of which are popular for snorkelling and scuba diving respectively.

This move by the Department of Marine Parks Kedah is an effort to preserve the biodiversity of marine life at the Park as the coral reef in both these areas are under stress due to changes in sea water temperatures and excessive coral bleaching is now at critical levels.

Once coral bleaching begins, it will take time, from a few weeks to several months, for it to return to a healthy state of normal coral density if the stressors can be decreased in time. At critical levels, it would take even longer but with prolonged and continued stress, the corals could eventually die. The Department of Marine Parks Kedah should be lauded for taking this bold move to protect Langkawi’s jewel in the crown. A round of applause is indeed due here.

Yes, there are many among us - divers, conservationists, environmentalists and casual bystanders - who have been waiting and hoping for a move such as this to be put in place to conserve and protect the precious and fragile marine ecosystem at Pulau Payar Marine Park. Perhaps it has taken too long. Is this too late now?

The Pulau Payar Marine Park have been totally over-utilised for tourism, particularly in the last decade. In addition to environmental stress from global phenomenon, including ozone depletion and climate change, its marine ecosystem has been put under tremendous undue stress from human impact. Based on the statistics published by the Department of Marine Parks, the number of visitors per year to Pulau Payar Marine Park had increased from a mere 3,668 in the year 1990 to 106,780 in the year 2000. The number of visitors had peaked at 135,272 in 2004 and there were a total of 102, 866 visitors in 2009. In view of the extremely high number of visitors to this seemingly popular dive destination, it is clear that the marine ecosystem at Pulau Payar is subjected to a high level of stress from human impact throughout the year.

In addition, the huge increase in the number of visitors has definitely exceeded the carrying capacity of this tiny island that measures barely 1.75 km in length and 0.5 km at its widest point. The tourism carrying capacity for Pulau Payar refers to its capacity to accommodate visitors and development without any negative impact to its marine environment and resources, while maintaining a reasonable level of visitor satisfaction. When the carrying capacity is exceeded, environmental degradation occurs and visitor dissatisfaction also sets in. In the long term, irreversible damage to the marine ecosystem as a result of overloading would be quite imminent.

It is a fact that in recent years, many tourists to Langkawi have been using Langkawi merely as a transit platform to travel to Koh Lipe, an island that forms part of the Tarutao National Marine Park in Southern Thailand, and is located to the North-West of Langkawi. Koh Lipe has been referred by many as the new dive destination in this region. It is laid back, undeveloped and its surrounding waters are truly pristine. For Koh Lipe, the South-West monsoon from May to November is dubbed as the green season as most dive resorts would be closed and it is deemed as the season for regeneration.

Looking further to the marine parks in the East Coast of Peninsular Malaysia, it will be found that most dive resorts there close during the North-East monsoon from November till April annually. Hence, the green season for regeneration is similarly enforced by the natural seasonal monsoon cycles.

Pulau Payar, on the other hand, has remained open to visitors throughout the entire year regardless of the monsoon cycles. With the current partial closure of the marine park, these coral reefs would still be subject to environmental stress from the change in sea water temperatures due to climate change. But without the hindrance of visitors adding to the stress, the corals may have an increased chance at some level of natural rehabilitation.

It should be realised that damage to the marine ecosystem would cause Pulau Payar Marine Park to eventually lose its aesthetic appeal leading to a drastic drop in visitor numbers and its impending death as a dive destination. Losing Langkawi’s jewel in the crown would be a great loss not only in terms of reef ecology but it would also impact negatively on the tourism industry in this region. A heavy responsibility sits on the shoulders of these decision makers as the Department of Marine Parks Kedah works to balance both the economic and environmental sustainability of this tiny island. Whether Pulau Payar Marine Park can be saved or not rests with them. This move for partial closure is only the first step towards the preservation of the marine ecosystem in Pulau Payar. A lot more need to be done for its sustainability in the long term.

The question now is whether the Department of Marine Parks Kedah will enforce the closure on an annual basis, for several months each year, to allow the natural rehabilitation process of the corals to take place?

Would the Department of Marine Parks Kedah also look into limiting visitor numbers to an acceptable capacity level from now on or allow the overexploitation to continue at the cost of coral reef degradation?