Located off
the northwest tip of Bird's Head Peninsula on the island of New Guinea, in
Indonesia's West Papua province, Raja Ampat, or the Four Kings, is an
archipelago comprising over 1,500 small islands, cays, and shoals surrounding
the four main islands of Misool, Salawati, Batanta, and Waigeo, and the smaller
island of Kofiau.
Raja Ampat
Regency is a new regency which separated from Sorong Regency in 2004. It
encompasses more than 40,000 km² of land and sea, which also contains
Cenderawasih Bay, the largest marine national park in Indonesia. It is a part
of the newly named West Papua (province) of Indonesia which was formerly Irian
Jaya. Some of the islands are the most northern pieces of land in the
Australian continent
The oceanic
natural resources around Raja Ampat give it significant potential as a tourist
area. Many sources place Raja Ampat as one of their top ten most popular places
for diving whilst it retains the number one ranking in terms of underwater
biodiversity.
According to
Conservation International, marine surveys suggest that the marine life
diversity in the Raja Ampat area is the highest recorded on Earth. Diversity is
considerably greater than any other area sampled in the Coral Triangle composed
of Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, and
East Timor. The Coral Triangle is the heart of the world's coral reef
biodiversity, making Raja Ampat quite possibly the richest coral reef
ecosystems in the world.
The area's
massive coral colonies along with relatively high sea surface temperatures,
also suggest that its reefs may be relatively resistant to threats like coral
bleaching and coral disease, which now jeopardize the survival of other coral
ecosystems around the world. The Raja Ampat islands are remote and relatively
undisturbed by humans.
The high
marine diversity in Raja Ampat is strongly influenced by its position between
the Indian and Pacific Oceans, as coral and fish larvae are more easily shared
between the two oceans. Raja Ampat's coral diversity, resilience, and role as a
source for larval dispersal make it a global priority for marine protection.
1,508 fish
species, 537 coral species (a remarkable 96% of all scleractinia recorded from
Indonesia are likely to occur in these islands and 75% of all species that
exist in the world), and 699 mollusk species, the variety of marine life is
staggering.Some areas boast enormous schools of fish and regular sightings of
sharks, such as wobbegongs.
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