The world’s eco-systems are at risk of “rapid degradation and collapse” according to a new United Nations report.
The third Global Biodiversity Outlook (GBO-3) published by the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) warns that unless “swift, radical and creative action” is taken “massive further loss is increasingly likely.”
Ahmed Djoghlaf, executive secretary of the CBD said in a statement: “The news is not good. We continue to lose biodiversity at a rate never before seen in history.”
The U.N. warns several eco-systems including the Amazon rainforest, freshwater lakes and rivers and coral reefs are approaching a “tipping point” which, if reached, may see them never recover.
The report says that no government has completely met biodiversity targets that were first set out in 2002 — the year of the first GBO report.
Executive Director of the U.N. Environmental Program Achim Steiner said there were key economic reasons why governments had failed in this task.
U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged governments to give biodiversity a “higher priority in all areas of decision making and in all economic sectors” and called for a “new vision for biological diversity.”
The CBD — an international treaty designed to sustain diversity of life on Earth — was set up at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992.
Source: U.N. report: Eco-systems at ‘tipping point’ – CNN
Date: 10 May 2010
Climate Change
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