Biodiversity, Or Biological Diversity - 1720 Words

Biodiversity, or biological diversity, is a technical term that captures diversity of the whole living world, from genes to individual species, through plant and animal communities and entire biomes (Defra, 2010). In other words, biodiversity represents genes, species, and ecosystems, which are the structural elements that are nestled within each other, and their ecological functions, in an area (Cepel, 1997; Ozcelik, 2006). Biodiversity provides the building blocks for our ecosystems to function, which provide us with a wide range of goods and services that support our economic and social wellbeing (Defra, 2011). For example, these include food, fresh water and clean air, along with protection from natural disasters, regulation of†¦show more content†¦Today, the effects of the changes caused by men can be felt by nearly 17,000 species of plants and animals that are face-to-face with extinction (Kucuk and Erturk, 2013). This threat of the mass extinction of the species was recognised several decades ago; however, since then, the best efforts have hardly done more than slow the pace of the accelerating damage (Myers, 2003). More than a decade after Myers (2003) made this point, Professor Sir John Lawton (2015) explains that biodiversity loss is still getting worse, not better; pollution in the oceans is rising; the planet seems to be running out of fresh water and its soils are degrading at an al arming rate. Essentially, the effects and total resource needs of human society were extremely small for most of human history. Nevertheless, since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, society has been growing in size and technological power, causing an ever-growing impact on the biosphere, to the point that the ecosystems services that society depends on are being degraded in ways that cannot be sustained (Robert et al., 2012). This study demonstrates this sustainability challenge with a funnel metaphor (Figure 1.1). Figure 1.1. The funnel metaphor shows the systematic decline in options for society The funnel metaphor shows our unsustainable society entering a funnel, which represents the