Biosphere Integrity
Biodiversity is not just something in nature. Biodiversity benefits humanity in numerous ways. It helps make the global economy more resilient and functions as an integral part of our culture and identity. Research has shown that it's even linked to our physical health.
The Planetary Boundaries Framework 2023 update (Rockström et al., 2023) found that six of nine boundaries are now over safety limits. Biodiversity is one of these six, and biodiversity loss and change are major threats to humanity. This transgression suggests that Earth is well outside of the safe operating space for humanity. Ripple (Ripple et al., 2023), in conjunction with Rockstrom, notes, "Life on planet Earth is under siege. We are now in an uncharted territory."
Biosphere integrity is crucial in regulating the Earth's system. Richardson notes that healthy planetary functioning of the biosphere "ultimately rests on its genetic diversity, inherited from natural selection not only during its dynamic history of coevolution with the geosphere but also on its functional role in regulating the state of Earth system" (Richardson et al., 2023). Genetic diversity, influenced by factors like extinctions, evolutionary rates, and functional integrity related to net primary production (NPP) and human appropriation of NPP (HANPP), are essential for ecosystem functioning. Maintaining biosphere integrity becomes more challenging as biodiversity declines and human impacts increase. The evidence of such extinctions and other changes requires setting boundaries for genetic diversity extinctions and HANPP to ensure sustainability, emphasizing the need for ecological balance and sustainable resource use to safeguard the biosphere's functional integrity on a planetary scale.
However, Earth's biodiversity has decreased significantly over the last few decades despite its importance. In fact, between 1970 and 2016, the population of vertebrate species fell by 68% on average worldwide. What's causing this global decline?
How has biodiversity changed over the years?
WWF's Living Planet Report 2020 (WWF, 2020) uses the Living Planet Index (LPI) to measure biodiversity worldwide. Using data from over 4,000 different species, LPI tracks the abundance of mammals, birds, fish, reptiles, and amphibians across the globe.
The WWF Living Planet Report 2020 provides a picture of each region's average decline between 1970 and 2016:
Biggest Causes of changes
Across the board, changes in land and sea use account for the most significant portion of loss, making up 50% of recorded threats to biodiversity on average. Species overexploitation is the second biggest threat at 24% on average, while invasive species take the third spot at 13%.
We can do a lot, individually and as small communities, to affect these negative changes. These will be reported in the MANA News.
References
Richardson, K., Steffen, W., Lucht, W., Bendtsen, J., Cornell, S. E., Donges, J. F., . . . Rockström, J. (2023). Earth beyond six of nine planetary boundaries. Science Advances, 9(37), eadh2458. doi:doi:10.1126/sciadv.adh2458
Ripple, W. J., Wolf, C., Gregg, J. W., Rockström, J., Newsome, T. M., Law, B. E., . . . King, S. D. A. (2023). The 2023 state of the climate report: Entering uncharted territory. BioScience, 73(12), 841-850. doi:10.1093/biosci/biad080
Rockström, J., Gupta, J., Qin, D., Lade, S. J., Abrams, J. F., Andersen, L. S., . . . Zhang, X. (2023). Safe and just Earth system boundaries. Nature, 619(7968), 102-111. doi:10.1038/s41586-023-06083-8
WWF. (2020). Living Planet Report 2020 - Bending the curve of biodiversity loss. Retrieved from Gland, Switzerland: https://files.worldwildlife.org/wwfcmsprod/files/Publication/file/279c656a32_ENGLISH_FULL.pdf?_ga=2.5968947.1697659809.1716895128-2077717873.1716895128
