Corals in the northern Red Sea have a gift the rest of the world's reefs would envy: they tolerate water warm enough to bleach reefs almost anywhere else, and in the record heatwave of 2021 two branching corals in the Gulf of Aqaba came through 31 degrees with no bleaching at all, which is why scientists speak of the coast as a refuge. In June, on World Environment Day, Egypt organised around that gift with the Egyptian Red Sea Initiative. Launched at Hurghada with the United Nations Development Programme and the Global Fund for Coral Reefs, it brings stronger management of the protected areas, wider monitoring of the reefs themselves, support for the small businesses that live by them, community based tourism along the coast, and, in the Minister's words, plans for an Egyptian Coral Reef Fund as a permanent way to pay for the reefs' care. One of the plainest measures is also the best: proper mooring buoys, so dive boats tie up instead of dropping anchor onto living coral.

Manal Awad, Egypt's Minister of Local Development and Environment, called it a purely Egyptian initiative turning national priorities into practical action, and the Governor of the Red Sea, Walid El-Barqi, stood beside her with the UNDP's Chitose Noguchi, project manager Yomna Emad, and a message from Yabanex Batista of the Global Fund for Coral Reefs, who called them among the most resilient reefs in the world. Diving is the lifeblood of towns like Hurghada and Marsa Alam, so the people who make a living from the reef are the ones being funded to look after it. Nothing here is a rescue. It is a coast deciding to keep what it has been given, and to keep it well.

Our short take: the launch was reported by Daily News Egypt (7 June 2026) and The Scuba News (3 August 2026), with details from the United Nations Development Programme in Egypt. Photograph: Sovernigo, CC BY-SA 4.0.