At the International Consultative Workshop on Economic Valuation and Policy Priorities for Sustainable Management of Coral Reefs, 10-12 December 2001, Penang, Malaysia, participants were divided into three working groups to discuss the future research directions for sustainable management of coral reefs. The groups focused on one of the following three themes: (i) economic valuation; (ii) policy analysis; and (iii) community participation. This paper is based on the outputs resulting from the group discussions.