Ocean's Amazon under threat

MANADO, Indonesia: Climate change could wipe out an ocean wilderness said to be the world's most diverse by the end of the century if nations do not drastically cut emissions, the environmental group WWF said yesterday.

Rising water temperatures, sea levels and acidity in the vast region threaten to destroy reefs in Southeast Asia's Coral Triangle, a region labeled the ocean's answer to the Amazon rainforest, the WWF report said.

Collapse of the reefs would send food production in the region plummeting by 80 percent and imperil the livelihoods of over 100 million people, forcing many to move from coastal villages to teeming cities, it warned.