Current factors of biodiversity loss

The current loss of biodiversity can be attributed to several different factors. Throughout the tropics, these are all increasing in intensity, but the main threats are from habitat loss and over harvesting.

Habitat loss

The highest driver of change over the last century, destruction of habitat continues to be the greatest threat to wildlife. Deforestation to clear land for agriculture or to harvest timber destroys the homes of many species that cannot live anywhere else, forcing them into extinction. Almost half of the Earth’s tropical forest cover has been destroyed in the last 40 years, and at current rates of deforestation, estimates predict 55% of the Amazon Rainforest could be severely damaged or gone by the year 2030. The picture below refers to the period between 1980–2000.

Overharvesting

The second driver of change in the tropics, over harvesting is an increasing concern. If we harvest natural products faster than they are replaced, we quickly turn a once renewable resource into a non-renewable resource i.e. we cause extinction. To rectify this, we simply need to ensure all our harvests are sustainable, whether they are fish, tropical hardwood, whales, or nuts. The monetary worth of sustaining a resource is exponentially higher than harvesting it to extinction.

Invasive species

Organisms have evolved over millions of years to suit their environment. They are suited to a small pocket in that ecosystem where they survive. When exotic organisms invade an area they displace the native inhabitants by competition or predation.

Pollution

Nutrients like phosphorus and nitrogen are important for ecosystem functioning, but too much can have disastrous results. Not only affecting the lives of humans, pollution damages the world in which we live. Contamination of water and soil weakens and erases many species.

Population growth

The human population is always growing. Around October 12th 1999 the world’s population reached six billion and has continued to grow at an annual rate of 1.4 percent since. Estimates predict it will reach ten billion late this century. More people mean all factors are multiplied.

Download the Millenium Ecosystem Assessment PDF

Why Care?

Biodiversity is integral to the planet’s life support system and is the planet’s most valuable resource. Going often unappreciated, biodiversity is what powers the many free services Earth provides, such as fertile soil, clean air, and fresh water. We need biodiversity to clean up our waste, pollinate our plants, and provide our food. Without biodiversity we could not exist.

Loss to medical research

In the US, 25% of all prescription drugs are derived from plants, 13% are from micro-organisms, and 3% are from animals. This means around 40% are sourced from living organisms. Only a very small fraction of biodiversity has been investigated for prospective pharmaceuticals. With the rainforests harbouring 50% of all known species on Earth, they are our best chance of finding more cures to the plethora of conditions and diseases affecting our lives. With discovery of antibiotics struggling to keep up with evolved resistance, and as we are in the wake of emerging super-diseases and ever increasing population density, there was never a better time to care for the environment. Medical researchers are locked in an arms race against rapidly evolving micro-organisms that will certainly get more intense. With every species vanishing from the earth goes the unique genetic information assembled over millions of years to protect and repair the species from diseases, bacterial or otherwise, in some cases identical to those afflicting humans. For instance, in the treatment of cancers, 70% of plants containing anti-cancer compounds identified by the US National Cancer Institute are only found in tropical rainforests.

Climate change

When forests are cleared, it results in more carbon in the atmosphere and less organisms able to store that carbon safely. More carbon in the atmosphere speeds up climate change, which negatively affects countless species including our own. As temperature is a cue for many animals and plants to enter different parts of their life cycle, some are out of sequence with the other organisms they depend on. For instance, if a flower is triggered to open earlier than it should due to climate change, the pollinating organism may not be active at that time of year. This means no pollination and, subsequently, no more flowers.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have assessed that global temperature will rise by 1.0 – 3.5 degrees Celsius by the year 2100. This will cause multiple negative effects, including the partial break-up of the Antarctic and Greenland ice shelves raising the water level by 30 cm. The rise in sea level will result in problems for coastal nations, including partial obliteration of some pacific countries. This increase in temperature is almost certainly attributed to the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide due to burning fossil fuels.

View simulation of population growth and CO2 emissions

Aesthetic Importance

Although it is true that extinction is a fact of life, and even paradoxically the driving force of life itself, if extinctions continue at current rates, we will lose a considerable proportion of the world’s species. The first five extinction events took ten million years on average to recover by natural selection. Scientists conclude we are at the beginning on the sixth. In order for the wonder of the natural world to have the same effect on your children’s children as it has had on you, we need to conserve what we have.

What can you do?

Clearly, it is unreasonable for the developed world to expect countries where the rainforests occur to leave the forests completely untouched when the developed world destroyed their biodiversity to create prosperous superpowers. And when it is the developed countries that demand the beef, the hardwood, the cocaine, the rubber, and the oil from these areas in the first place. Ecotourism is mentioned as a way to source revenue from the rainforests while keeping them intact.

Jared Diamond offers some helpful advice in his book ‘Collapse’ to steer the planet away from impending catastrophe:

There are several types of action achievable by everyone that prove effective in helping the future of our planet. But, unless you are in a position of immense wealth and power, you cannot make a difference by a single action or by a series of actions completed over a few weeks. In order to make a difference, plan to commit to a consistent policy of actions over the duration of your life:

In a democracy, the simplest way to help is to vote. Candidates can have very different environmental agendas, and some of these elections are settled by a ridiculously small number of votes. Aside from voting, you can find out the address of your electoral representative and let them know your specific view on current environmental problems. If they don’t hear from voters, they will make incorrect assumptions that voters do not care for the environment.

As a consumer, you can reconsider what you buy. Big business promote products the public buy and discontinue products the public don’t buy. Logging companies are increasingly adopting sustainable logging practise, and the reason is that consumer demand for wood products certified by the Forest Stewardship Council exceeds supply. Aside from controlling what you buy, another way to influence big business is to draw public attention to their policies and products. Not merely drawing attention to policies you don’t like, but also praising companies adopting policies you do like.

If you are religious, you can gather support from your church, synagogue, or mosque. People are more likely to follow the advice of a religious leader than they are a politician or scientist.

As an individual you can invest time and effort into improving your local environment. Not only does this improve your own quality of life, but also sets an example to others.

You can multiply your impact by donating to an organization promoting policies of your choice. If you are concerned with population growth, you can donate to Population Connection. For biodiversity directly, you can donate to the Nature Conservancy or WWF among others.

To keep informed on current environmental news, you can join a group, such as Mongabay rainforest news or the Nature Conservancy blog. To help conservation, you can support ecotourism by simply booking a trip to the rainforest or visiting a national park.

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