State of the Reef Report 2004: Water Quality

Abstract

The Great Barrier Reef region is a focus for agricultural production, tourism, shipping, and expanding urban centres that present a risk to the Reef from pollution. Although the region is relatively sparsely populated, the land has been extensively modified during the last 200 years of European settlement. Run-off from activities such as cattle grazing, vegetation clearance and intensive cropping, and from urban development, are the main human influences on water quality in the Great Barrier Reef. Raised concentrations of sediment and nutrients have long been regarded as the principal water quality threats to the Great Barrier Reef. The threat from other pollutants such as persistent pesticides has been more recently recognised. The major anthropogenic source of excess nutrients, sediments and pesticides on the Great Barrier Reef is agriculture.