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STATE OF THE WORLD 2012
Moving Toward Sustainable Prosperity
POLICY
BRIEFS
Biodiversity: Combating the
Sixth Mass Extinction
Chapter 15
Bo Normander
K ey M essag es
8 The rate at which species are becoming extinct is
estimated to be up to 1,000 times higher today
than in pre-industrial times.
8 The Living Planet Index estimates that since
1992, biodiversity has declined 12 percent globally, and 30 percent in the tropical regions.
8 At the 1992 Rio Summit, leaders made a commitment to preserve biological resources through the
United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity. But extinction and biodiversity loss has continued, and there is a fundamental lack of political
will to act on biodiversity threats.
T he P ro b lem
Biodiversity is being lost on all scales, from microorganisms to large mammals, at a rapid rate. The loss
of biodiversity has not received the same amount of
attention as climate change, in part because there
is less scientific knowledge and consensus on the
subject, but not because it is a less urgent threat to
life on Earth.
To understand the importance of biodiversity in a
habitat or ecosystem, imagine biodiversity as a house
of cards, with each card representing a single species or
organism. A few cards may be removed without much
happening to the house, but if certain cards or enough
cards are pulled out, the whole house will collapse.
Species are interlinked through food webs, pollination, predation, symbioses, antibioses, and many more
interactions, many of which are unknown.
Between 1980 and 2008, an average of 52 species
per year were moved one category closer to extinction, and the rate of biodiversity loss shows no signs
of slowing. As a result, scientists have called this
period the “sixth mass extinction” in human history;
the last extinction saw the end of the dinosaurs during the Cretaceous period, 65 million years ago.
Human intervention is the cause of this period
of extinction. The five main pressures driving
biodiversity loss are habitat change, pollution,
overexploitation of species, invasive alien species, and
climate change—and all of these are almost exclusively human-driven.
The world’s oceans and forests are particularly
threatened. Industrial fishing with trawls from large
vessels causes extensive damage to both marine
health and species biodiversity. And coral reefs, which
are great harbors of biodiversity, are showing increasing signs of stress: about one-fifth of the world’s
coral reefs have already been lost or severely damaged, while another 35 percent could be lost in the
next 10 to 40 years.
Deforestation is another major cause of biodiversity loss. Between 1990 and 2010, the global forest
area shrank by 3.4 percent, or 1.4 million square
kilometers—an area roughly the size of Mexico.
Deforestation continues at a high rate in many
countries, mainly in the form of conversion of forests
to agricultural land, much of which is done illegally.
In Indonesia, approximately 12 million hectares of
tropical forest are supposedly protected, but illegal
logging, agricultural encroachment, and poaching
continue to destroy forests.
From an ethical perspective, it is not right for
humans to decide which species survive and which
do not. To take a more self-interested view, humans
need intact ecosystems to meet their basic needs for
food, clean water and air, medicine, fuel, biological
materials, and more. These ecosystems are threatened, in part, because of the high rate of biodiversity
loss: the 2005 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment
reported that 15 out of 24 key ecosystem services are
in decline, including clean air and water.
There has been a lack of political success in conserving biodiversity, beginning with the ambiguity of
the biodiversity targets set by the 1992 Convention
on Biological Diversity (CBD). In 2002, the CBD
committed “to achieve by 2010 a significant reduction of the current rate of biodiversity loss”—but delegates meeting in Nagoya, Japan, in 2010 concluded
that the target had not been met, whether measured
globally, regionally, or nationally.
The target was renewed with the adoption of the
Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011–2020, with 20 new
targets, known as the Aichi Biodiversity Targets. Some
Aichi targets are ambitious, some less so, and some
issues have been left completely unaddressed, such as
urban biodiversity. The targets also impose weak legal
obligations, and are often vague and unambitious.
the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and
Ecosystem Services (IPBES) with the aim of making
the 2020 biodiversity targets reachable. But much
greater resources must be invested in IPBES to make
it effective, and allocating resources is an obvious task
for the Rio+20 conference.
M ov i n g F orward
L ook i n g A head
Innovations must occur both on the national and
global level to halt biodiversity loss. On a national
level, governments must address the forces behind
overexploitation and other causes of biodiversity loss.
To lessen deforestation, for example, governments
should identify and alleviate the pressures behind
encroaching on forests to produce timber, food, animal fodder, and biofuels. Workers engaging in illegal
activities causing deforestation, such as unpermitted
logging, should be assigned to jobs that help protect
forest ecosystems rather than destroy them. Such
an approach has been used in other areas: Brazil’s
TAMAR sea turtle program, for example, pays former poachers to protect rather than exploit the turtle
population, providing employment and other public
benefits to coastal communities in the northeast.
Cooperation between governments is also necessary to raise global awareness of biodiversity loss
and to create targets to reverse this loss. In early
2011, an intergovernmental panel agreed to create
The Rio+20 conference presents a great opportunity
to renew and fortify global and national commitments
to halt biodiversity loss. One area that needs particular
focus is improved regulation of protected and reserved
lands and marine areas. In Indonesia, for example, a
joint analysis revealed that some 1.3 million hectares
of forest are simultaneously protected and within
logging concessions. Part of the task of the Rio+20
conference is to ensure that local and national authorities have the resources and means to protect the land
and seas under their jurisdiction.
But as important as the protection of natural habitats and the implementation of ambitious biodiversity targets are, lowering the unsustainable consumption rate per person, especially in industrial nations,
is just as crucial. The current model of consumer
societies is destroying the planet and its resources—
thus, conserving biodiversity will require some fundamental changes in the way people consume natural
resources and understand their surroundings.
Red List Status of Species by Major Groups, 2011
Percent of Evaluated Species
100
Source: IUCN
80
Extinct
Critically Endangered
Endangered
Vulnerable
Near Threatened
Least Concern
Data Deficient
60
40
20
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This brief is based on Chapter 15, “Biodiversity: Combating the Sixth Mass Extinction,” by Bo Normander,
2.0
published in Worldwatch Institute’s State of the World 2012: Moving Source:
Toward
Sustainable Prosperity.
WWF
To order a copy of the report, visit www.worldwatch.org/stateoftheworld2012.
Additional policy briefs, essays,
and select report chapters are available at http://sustainableprosperity.org.
1.5
dex Value
Temperate Living Planet Index
1.0
Global Living Planet Index