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General Description
- Tubbataha Reefs and surrounding waters in the central Sulu Sea, Palawan province was established as a protected area under Presidential Proclamation No. 306 on 11 August 1988 (then called Tubbataha Reef National Marine Park). It became officially known as the Tubbataha Reefs Natural Park on 16 April 2010 by RA No. 10067 under the NIPAS Act (RA No. 7586) and the Strategic Environmental Plan (SEP) for Palawan Act (RA No. 7611).
- It initially comprises two atolls: the North and South Atoll. The Park’s territory has since been expanded to include Jessie Beazley Reef. Thus, it covers a total strict protection zone of 97,030 hectares, and a buffer zone surrounding its perimeter by 10 nautical miles of 356,500 hectares since 2010.
- TRNP was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1993, a Ramsar Site in 1998, a marine key biodiversity area (mKBA) in 2009, an ASEAN Heritage Park in 2014, an East Asian-Australasian Flyway Partner in 2015, and a Particularly Sensitive Sea Area by the International Maritime Organization in 2017, the only one in Southeast Asia to date.
- It has high-quality marine habitats containing two atolls (North and South Atoll) and an emergent coral cay, Jessie Beazley Reef, a spectacular 100-metre perpendicular wall, extensive lagoons, and a large area of open seas (average depth of 750 m). Its key features and processes are the reef system which has a very high density of marine species, with almost 700 demersal and pelagic species reported within its pristine coral reefs (360 coral spp., equivalent to about 80% of all coral species in the Philippines), and seagrass beds (7 seagrass spp.), which includes endangered humphead wrasse (Cheilinus undulatus) and the vulnerable Giant Grouper (Epinephelus lanceolatus).
- TRNP protects about 181 globally threatened species, from vulnerable to critically endangered, based on the IUCN categories. Some examples include marine turtles, dolphins and whales, sharks and rays. It has recorded some of the largest densities of grey and whitetip reef sharks in the world.
- The North Islet has important populations of seabirds, with a few remaining colonies of breeding seabirds in the region and is thus identified as a Seabird Sentinel Site in the Philippines.
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Primary Threats
- Climate change, erosion of bird islets, inadequate infrastructure, marine debris, adverse effects of tourism, illegal fishing, escalating shipping activities around TRNP, and energy exploration.
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