TECH4ALL: Protecting China's Coral Colonies

Coral reefs may make up less than 1% of the ocean, but they’re home to around 25% of all the world’s marine life. 

As well as providing a food source for more than 4,000 species of fish, coral ecosystems provide a range of other benefits. They serve as a coastal buffer, protecting coastlines and seaside communities from storms and water surges by slowing water flow and limiting coastal erosion. They clean the ocean, leaving it crystal clear as coral colonies and sponges feed on particles in the water. And, of course, they are tourist magnets and diving hotspots, providing immeasurable leisure value.

However, researchers estimate that 90% of the world’s coral reefs could disappear by 2050 if current trends continue. Pollution, overfishing, coastal development, and rising sea temperatures are just some of the factors threatening these fragile but vital ecosystems. 
Dongshan Island: A biodiversity treasure trove

In November, two key events on the marine conservation calendar made a splash in China’s Xiamen: the 2024 East Asian Seas Congress and 2024 Xiamen World Ocean Week. 

During the 2024 East Asian Seas Congress, the Huawei TECH4ALL team caught up with Professor Liu Min from Xiamen University’s College of Ocean and Earth Sciences. We took a trip to the university’s observatory on nearby Dongshan Island to explore how Huawei TECH4ALL, Xiamen University, and China’s Society of Entrepreneurs & Ecology are leveraging tech to help protect China’s northernmost stony coral ecosystem.

Professor Liu explains the benefits of technology

Deployed earlier this year, the solution uses underwater cameras to monitor three coral sites along the coastal area. It can identify and analyze fish and coral species, coral health, and coral bleaching, automatically transmitting the data to a cloud platform for analysis by AI.

The aims? To take scientific research and understanding of the coral ecosystem to the next level and drive adaptive conservation management based on data-driven insights.

Professor Liu points out that as the monitoring and analytics system runs 24/7, the volume of data paints a precise picture of what is happening in the coral ecosystem - for example, the AI algorithm can analyze the 450,000 video frames of a five-hour video in just 39 minutes.

“The technology we’ve introduced now can quickly identify fish - the number of species, the biomass, it can count individual fish. Then we can analyze the fish activity and even observe their behavior,” says Liu. “So, then we can have a complete dataset and we can compare when the fish are active, in the morning or in the afternoon. Our students don’t have to do a lot of lab work.”

The system in action

In comparison, insights from manual observations were sparse due to limited monitoring times coupled with a lack of long-term data. Weather conditions and poor underwater visibility further complicated the already cost- and labor-intensive manual monitoring.

“With the solution, we can increase the monitoring areas,” Liu says. “We’ve also increased the accuracy of capturing fish species, because with eye contact, we often miss species.”

The solution has in fact achieved a sevenfold increase in recognition accuracy, so far identifying 35 fish species and five coral species with an accuracy rate of 95% and 99%, respectively.

A more complete data-driven picture of what’s happening under the sea’s surface frees up university students to conduct valuable scientific research, and evaluate long-term trends and the factors that impact the health of coral colonies such as coral bleaching. Indeed, the coral colonies lining the coast of Dongshan Island are susceptible to hydrodynamic changes and climate change, with eight species of reef-making coral are protected as Category II at the national level.

Nevertheless, Liu states that the overall health of the coral colonies lining the coastline of Dongshan County are currently good and that, “rising temperatures help the coral colonies to grow faster.” However, she also warns that, “this is because they haven’t yet reached the temperature limit for growth.”

Current threats

One major threat to Dongshan Island’s coral colonies are fishing and leisure diving boats dropping anchors. Not only does this break up the coral, but it turns the coral segments over when the anchors are raised.

Professor Liu explains the impact of fishing boat anchors

Underwater monitoring enables the conservation team to reposition and restore the affected coral, enabling it to regrow and thrive. It’s also prompted the ocean administration organization to deploy buoys in key locations where the boats can affix their anchors and avoid harming the coral.

“Another issue is sedimentation,” says Liu, “as a confluence of river estuaries meet at the ocean.” Sediments can settle on top of corals and smother them, with most coral having very poor mechanisms for removing sedimentation.

Using AI-powered monitoring tech to identify issues such as coral and marine life health, climate change, the impact of the fishing industry, and sedimentation is essential to catch threats early on - before the negative outcomes create a domino effect of degradation from which this currently healthy ecosystem would never recover.

Two other expected outcomes of this TECH4ALL project are expected alongside its ecological and scientific value: The first is scalability - replicating the same approach, algorithms, and solutions to benefit other protected coastal areas. The second is educating the public on the value of conserving our ecosystem.

During our visit, Professor Liu hosted a group of middle-school children and gave them a lecture on coral conservation

Huawei TECH4ALL at the 2024 East Asian Seas Congress

At the congress, the Huawei TECH4ALL team presented three cases on how we’re technology can protect marine life.

• Coral Reef Protection in Dongshan Island
• Saving Norway’s Endangered Wild Atlantic Salmon
• Protecting Green Sea Turtles in China’s Nesting Grounds

Huawei TECH4ALL’s Gary Maidment addresses congress attendees on the power of tech & partnerships in marine conservation

Learn more about Huawei’s TECH4ALL initiative and follow us on @TECH4ALL_Huawei on X for the latest on how tech & partnerships are enabling sustainability and inclusion across the globe.

Disclaimer: Any views and/or opinions expressed in this post by individual authors or contributors are their personal views and/or opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views and/or opinions of Huawei Technologies.