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Biodiversity is increasingly threatened. Populations of wild mammals, fish, birds, amphibians and reptiles have declined by an average of 68 percent between 1970 and 2016, which is the last year that official statistics are available.
This is demonstrated by the Living Planet Report of the World Wide Fund for Nature, WWF, which has examined the condition of 20,811 populations of 4,392 species of wild vertebrates around the world.
– We are now in an emergency situation and on the way to the sixth mass extinction, says Louise Carlsson, a biologist and nature conservation expert at WWF.
Freshwater environments have been the hardest hit, with surveyed populations declining by an average of 84 percent. Fish, amphibians and reptiles are the most vulnerable.
– The clearest changes are in South and Central America and the Caribbean, where the population has fallen by as much as 94 percent, says Louise Carlsson.
In Europe and Central Asia stocks have declined by an average of 24 percent, in Asia and the Pacific by 45 percent and in Africa by 65 percent.
The report lays out five main reasons for the large reductions: habitats disappear when intact natural environments are converted to agricultural land, species are overexploited through fishing, agriculture and forestry, climate change, invasive species and contamination.
– The conversion of forests, grasslands and savannahs into agricultural or grazing land for meat production is one of the main reasons for the sharp decline in South America, says Louise Carlsson.
– The Northern Hemisphere, Europe and North America have suffered a great loss of biodiversity in the past and are therefore starting from an already low level. Therefore, the loss does not seem so dramatic there.
The population of the Chinese sturgeon on the Yangtze River it decreased by 97 percent between 1982 and 2015 mainly due to the construction of dams. The leatherback turtle population in Costa Rica has decreased an average of 84 percent between 1995 and 2011 due to hunting, bycatch, and habitat loss.
According to the report, the pressure on natural resources is constantly increasing and humanity lives as if we had 1.6 planets. They cite the report released by the UN Scientific Panel on Biological Diversity, IPBES, last year, which found that up to 75 percent of the planet’s land surface, 66 percent of the oceans and 85 percent of the wetlands have been greatly altered by humans. Since the 1970s, the world’s population has doubled. The production of agricultural products, fish, bioenergy and the use of fossil fuels has increased during the same period.
But it is possible to reverse the trend Through, among other things, specific measures such as the conservation and restoration of nature, such as wetlands.
– The most important are nature conservation efforts, but it is only when we have a combination with sustainable food production, with less meat and less food waste that they have the greatest effect.
In some places, protected areas and, for example, stops to hunt or trap, have led to an increase in stocks. Blackfin reef sharks have increased by 360 percent in a population in Australia. The giant panda in China and the tiger have also had a positive development. In the oceans, whales such as blue whales and humpback whales have also increased
WWF presents a list of requirements to politicians to stop negative development: protect at least 30 percent of land and sea. Increase efforts to recreate nature. Stop the loss of species. Halve the footprint of consumption and production by completely changing the use of land and water.
– In Sweden, things are going well for some mammals and raptors, but things are worse for other species of birds, butterflies and mosses. The biggest impact is deforestation and the regeneration of agricultural land.
The reduction of biological diversity can also be seen in Sweden. When the Species Data Bank released its list of endangered species last spring, 22 percent were on the red list, an 11 percent increase since the previous list was released five years ago, when 19 percent it was on the red list.
– We cannot live without biodiversity. It is the basis of our existence and well-being, without it we put health, employment and a sustainable economy at risk. It is also important for us to be able to handle a warmer climate, as it contributes to resilient ecosystems, which can also absorb greenhouse gases, says Louise Carlsson.
