The increasing loss of biodiversity is closely related to water scarcity, food security, health, and climate change according to statistics.
To such an extent that the poor situation of one of these factors drags the others in a “cascade” reaction. This is warned by a recent report from the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES).
“Efforts made separately are ineffective and counterproductive, solving one problem and causing another,” warns the study published on Tuesday. This refers to the urgent need for joint action.
Alarming biodiversity loss: the numbers
This report provides scientific evidence to countries about a situation that was not unknown but had not been studied globally.
Biodiversity, meaning all types of life on Earth, including ecosystems, is decreasing at all levels, from the global to the local and in all regions.
Global biodiversity loss.
Considering the indicators evaluated in the report, biodiversity has decreased between 2% and 6% per decade over the last 30 to 50 years. In this scenario, one million species are facing extinction.
The value of the nature being destroyed is equivalent to more than half of the global Gross Domestic Product (GDP). That is, more than 50 trillion dollars of annual economic activity largely depend on it.
Additionally, around 1 billion people depend on forests for their livelihood.
Main causes
Biodiversity loss results from several factors. In 2019, this UN platform identified the main drivers: land and sea use change, unsustainable exploitation, invasive exotic species, and pollution.
The latest report goes further and incorporates indirect socio-economic elements. Among them are the increase in waste, excessive consumption, global food supply, or the population growth, worsening the repercussions on all pieces of the puzzle.
The study highlights that the impact of these losses is unequal. “More than half of the world’s population lives in areas experiencing the greatest impacts from biodiversity decline, water availability and quality, food security, as well as increased health risks and negative effects of climate change,” it emphasizes.
“And, of course, it is the developing countries, the indigenous peoples and local communities that are most exposed,” it adds.
Solving the situation
The consequences of biodiversity loss.
It must be considered that approximately 80% of humanity’s freshwater demand is used for food production.
In this sense, regenerative agriculture emerges as one of the most sustainable methods.
“It combines techniques to increase food production with soil conservation, water quality improvement, and carbon emission reduction, contributing to biodiversity and greater food sustainability and climate resilience,” indicates the policy interaction manager at CREAF (Centre for Ecological Research and Forestry Applications) Alicia Pérez-Porro.
“This report is especially relevant because we often talk about climate change, food production, or oceans as if they were all disconnected, but they are not, we need to build synergies,” she adds.
However, it highlights the difficulties of negotiations with the 147 participating countries.
The authors present over 70 options that can be adopted with “broadly positive effects” on all elements involved in this nature crisis.
Among them are the restoration of carbon-rich ecosystems such as forests, soils, or mangroves; biodiversity management to reduce the risk of animal-to-human disease transmission; landscape management improvement; nature-based urban solutions; healthy and sustainable diets; and support for indigenous food systems.
Biodiversity loss.
Other equally important options may not benefit all elements if not applied carefully, such as offshore wind energy and dams.
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