Biodiversity, the variety of life on earth, will continue to decline until 2050 and beyond if the world continues with “business as usual”, a United Nations report said this week. The increasing impacts of land and sea use change, overexploitation, climate change, pollution and invasive alien species are some of the contributory factors,The Global Biodiversity [...]

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Biodiversity finale beckons: UN

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Biodiversity, the variety of life on earth, will continue to decline until 2050 and beyond if the world continues with “business as usual”, a United Nations report said this week.

The increasing impacts of land and sea use change, overexploitation, climate change, pollution and invasive alien species are some of the contributory factors,The Global Biodiversity Outlook states. These patterns are driven by unsustainable patterns of production and consumption, population growth and technological development.

“The projected decline in biodiversity will affect all people but it will have a particularly detrimental effect on indigenous peoples and local communities, and the world’s poor and vulnerable, given their reliance on biodiversity for their wellbeing,” the report warns.

“The COVID-19 pandemic has further highlighted the importance of the relationship between people and nature,” it says.

“While the relationship between biodiversity and infectious disease is complex, it is clear that the loss and degradation of biodiversity undermines the web of life and increases the risk of disease spillover from wildlife to people.”

Efforts to conserve and restore biodiversity, therefore, need to be scaled up at all levels using approaches that will depend on local context.

These must be combined with major increases in the extent and effectiveness of well-connected protected areas and other effective area-based conservation measures; large-scale restoration of degraded habitats; and improvements in the condition of nature across farmed and urban landscapes as well as inland water bodies, coasts and oceans.

Steps must be taken to address invasive alien species, pollution and the unsustainable exploitation of biodiversity especially in marine and inland water ecosystems, the report says. Transformations need to be achieved in the production of goods and services, especially food.

This will include adopting agricultural methods that can meet growing global demand while imposing fewer negative impacts on the environment, and reducing the pressure to convert more land to production.

Transformations are similarly needed to limit the demand for increased food production by adopting healthier diets and reducing food waste, and also in limiting the consumption of other material goods and services affecting biodiversity, for example in forestry, energy and provision of fresh water.

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