Biodiversity loss: the forgotten crisis

ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity 22 Jan 09;

When the subprime mortgage crisis hit the United States, fear of a deep and prolonged recession quickly spread across continents. Another panic attack ensued when the Melamine scare shook milk-importing countries. World attention is focused on the humanitarian implications of the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. Buried under these infamous issues and other problems such as terrorism, high crimes, and corruption is a less popular crisis with far greater implications than anyone can imagine -- biodiversity loss.
“We are losing plants, animals and other species at unprecedented rates due to deforestation, large-scale mining, massive wildlife hunting and other irresponsible human activities. This poses a significant threat to our food security, health, livelihood, and the world’s overall capacity to provide for our needs and those of future generations’,” ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity Executive Director Rodrigo U. Fuentes said.

The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment published in 2005 reported that humans have increased extinction levels dramatically over the past decades at 100 to 1,000 times the normal background rate. In Southeast Asia alone, 1,312 out of 64,800 species are endangered.

“Ultimately, the loss of biodiversity is one of the greatest threats that we face. No one will argue that it is in the area of food security, perhaps more than any other, that biodiversity’s value is most clear.

Nature provides the plant and animal resources for food production and agricultural productivity.

When we destroy biodiversity, we destroy our source of food,” Director Fuentes explained.

The Food and Agriculture Organization reported that out of more than 10,000 different plant species used for food by humans over the millennia, barely 150 species remain under cultivation. Of these, only 12 species provide 80 percent of the world’s food needs and only four – rice, wheat, maize and potatoes – provide more than half of human’s energy requirements. “What happened to the 9,850 other species? If they have not been lost already, they are vulnerable,” Director Fuentes said.

The ongoing food crisis, he explained, is testament to decades of misguided energy policies, extensive use of unsustainable agricultural practices, and wanton destruction of nature and damage to ecological services.

Health is another arena where the natural benefits of a healthy biodiversity are most obvious. “The natural world holds the key to many medicinal resources and pharmaceutical drugs. If the world continues to lose around 13 million hectares of its forest cover every year, it would be difficult to develop better kinds of medicine to cure both existing and emerging illnesses. We have to remember that about 80 percent of the world's known biodiversity, many of which have medicinal value, could be found in forests,” Director Fuentes said.

The ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity, an intergovernmental regional centre of excellence that facilitates coordination among the members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), and with relevant national governments, regional and international organizations on the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity, is at the forefront of highlighting the importance of conserving biodiversity in Southeast Asia.

According to the Centre, apart from providing people with food and medicine, nature also offers a wide range of ecosystem services such as contribution to climate stability, maintenance of ecosystems, soil formation and protection, and pollution breakdown and absorption. Biodiversity is also a source of livelihood to millions as the economy of many communities is driven by the use of species in industries such as biotechnology, forestry, agriculture and fisheries. Moreover, biodiversity provides social benefits including recreation and tourism, as well as cultural and aesthetic values.

“Forgetting the biodiversity crisis is therefore akin to cutting our lifeline to the world’s natural treasures. We at ACB wish to remind everyone that extinction is forever. And with every species lost, the natural ecosystems we call home become biologically poorer,” Director Fuentes underscored.

The consensus to save the region’s thinning biodiversity moved the ASEAN, with funding support from the European Union (EU), to establish the ASEAN Regional Centre for Biodiversity Conservation (ARCBC) project. From 1999 to 2004, the project facilitated collaboration among ASEAN Member States for biodiversity-related initiatives. A year later in 2005, the ASEAN and EU agreed to establish the ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity to carry on the work of the completed ARCBC project.

“It is the first regional initiative to save the ASEAN’s rich but highly threatened biodiversity,” Director Fuentes said. All ASEAN Member States are signatories to the Convention on Biological Diversity, the first global agreement to cover the conservation of biological diversity, the sustainable use of its components, and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the use of genetic resources. By signing the convention, they committed to reducing biodiversity loss by 2010 --- the International Year of Biodiversity.

With its slogan “Conserving Biodiversity, Saving Humanity,” ACB performs its mandate through five components: program development and policy coordination, human and institutional capacity development, biodiversity information management, public and leadership awareness of biodiversity values; and sustainable financing mechanism.

To further shore up its efforts, ACB also forms alliances with key stakeholders in the regional and global levels. “There is an urgent need to involve all sectors to save the region’s endangered biodiversity. The issue may not be as hot as politics or the global financial crisis, but massive biodiversity loss will have a huge impact on the lives of hundreds of millions if left unsolved. Our biodiversity faces a bright future if all sectors would work together to conserve it,” Director Fuentes underscored.