dr. miguel fortes is a scientist based here, together with colleagues of japan, he has been researching boracaysland since 2012. dr. fortes has focused on the coral off shore to try to understand the causes of the beach erosion. >> first coral reef what, is it? it's a structure dominated coral between animals and plants. microscopic plants. they live together, and living together, they form what we now see as the corals. the corals form as an ecosystem, the coral reef. >> it's related to sea amenies. >> on the surface are numerous small tentables, known as polyps. inside the polyps live flitoplankin, producing amino acids. these amino acids are absorbed by the nutrients. calcium within seawater, calum carbonate skeleton. the slow growing coral is very sensitive to changes in its environment. this satellite image shows the sea bed around boracay island. the island is in the middle. the coral areas are shown in pink. dr. fortes paid attention off the white beach. by following the changes occurring since 1988, the decline is very easy to analysis shows that the amount of coral in the sea off white