Science: Life's Diversity "being Depleted"

Society | March 24, 2006, Friday // 00:00

Almost all indicators of the likely future for the diversity of life on Earth are heading in the wrong direction, a major new report says.

The Global Biodiversity Outlook (GBO) is published as national delegates gather in Brazil under the UN Convention on Biological Diversity. The Convention commits governments to slow the decline in the richness of living systems by 2010.

It sets out 15 indicators of progress towards the 2010 target, ranging from trends in the extent of wildlife habitats to the build-up of nutrients such as nitrogen which can harm aquatic life.

Only one of the 15 - the area of the world's surface officially protected for wildlife - is moving in the right direction for biodiversity.

Even here, however, most areas still fall far short of targets to protect 10% of each region with distinctive combinations of species.

The other indicators point to an accelerating decline, which has seen the rates of species extinctions surge to their highest levels since the demise of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago.

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