Human activity destroying species

25 Dec, 2016 - 00:12 0 Views
Human activity destroying species

The Sunday Mail

Ibo Foroma Rastafarian Perspectives —
NORMALLY genetically-modified organisms socially accepted in context, and 2,3 million chickens are eaten daily in South Africa alone.

Multiplied by 365/366, including festive holidays, the number of defenceless chicken generations butchered or slaughtered exceeds one billion annually. Since total human population is between 7 and 8 billion, meat-eating human beings are making a massive killing.

Especially in the Amazon jungle, supplying the meat demand embroils mass land clearing for animal husbandry hence destroys habitats. This endangering behaviour is not only global, it is viral.

Habitat loss and degradation affect 89 percent of all threatened birds, 83 percent of mammals, and 91 percent of threatened plants globally (IUCN 2007). Organic life known only to exist on Earth thrives on biodiversity.

Nonetheless, through the use or abuse of advanced tools provided by science and technology, human activity is annihilating species.

Agriculture, an age-old human invention and mining, of which 90 percent is open cast, fishing, hunting, housing, industrial pollution, burning fossil fuels, nuclear wastes, hazardous material contamination, over-exploitation of resources (plants and animals) and so forth contribute immensely towards exterminating species.

The exponential growth of megalopolises coupled by small villages and towns that envy their “development” engulfs titanic space benefiting only one specie. Rodents and “pests” are fumigated.

Biodiversity, the variety of species and their habitats, plays an important role in ecosystem function and in the many services ecosystems provide. These include nutrient and water cycling, soil formation and retention, resistance against invasive species, plant pollination, climate regulation, pest and pollution control etc.

Escalating biodiversity loss has widespread implications for both human and environmental security. Invasions of alien species, cats and rats on islands, coral bleaching, global climate change, humans induced changes in migratory species brought by fences and boundaries etc, force species to extinction.

Invasion of alien predators is the method that homosapiens applied to drive into extinction dodos, the most famous extinct species.

About 1,9 million species have been described out of an estimated 13-14 million species that exist, from which only 15 300 are well documented. However, current species extinction rate is estimated to be between 1,000 and 10,000 times higher than the natural or ‘background’ rate.

Opposed to anarchy, the “enlightened age” is supposed to transform the planet towards utopia. Human civilisation must develop Earth into the imagined Garden of Eden and not butchery or species slaughter house.

Extinction is both a natural and unnatural process. Our home is over hundreds of millions of years old, continents have broken apart; oceans appeared, mountains formed and torn away.

This geological dynamism causes severe changes in living organisms. Species populations and whole lineages disappear. However, thank God the unfathomable, new ones emerge.

The Sixth Extinction Crisis is man-mad/e. About 100 million metric tons of aquatic organisms, including fish (tuna), molluscs and crustaceans, are taken from the wild every year and represent a vital contribution to world food security.

Despite though, like drowning herds of cattle, kidnapping aquatic creatures from their habitat is excruciating. Meat from wild animals forms a critical contribution to food sources and livelihoods in many countries with high levels of poverty and food insecurity.

A huge range of species are involved including monkeys, tapirs, antelopes, pigs, pheasants, warthogs, elephants, rhinos, turtles, snakes, and birds.

This has resulted in one in four mammals and one in eight birds facing a high risk of extinction in the near future. One in three amphibians and almost half of all tortoises and freshwater turtles are threatened. From 2007 statistics, the total number of known threatened animal species increased from 5 205 to 8 462 since 1996.

An estimated 50 000 – 70 000 plant species are used in traditional and modern medicine worldwide. The monetary value of goods and services provided by ecosystems is estimated to amount to some 33 trillion dollars per year.

Generally, species extinction is when no member of the species remains alive anywhere in the world. A specie is extinct in the wild if it is only alive in captivity and locally extinct when it is no longer found in an area it used to inhabit but is still found elsewhere.

A specie is ecologically extinct if it persists in such reduced numbers that its effects on other species is negligible. Human beings are earth’s alpha-apex predator, and are chiefly responsible for endangering “primitive” species. This we call Babylon System.

Most people think land species are the only affected, marine species are proving to be just as much at risk as their land-based counterparts. Hippopotamus, sharks, freshwater fish and Mediterranean flowers face extinction.

All 22 species of albatross are under threat as a result of long-line fishing. Penguins and polar bears are disappearing due to polar ice melting from global warming.

Of the amphibians, 29 percent of species are affected by pollution and climate change and 17 percent by diseases, particularly chytridiomycosis. The interaction between disease and extreme climatic events like drought is the leading theory behind widespread amphibian declines. The climate humans change(d).

There are many examples of the effects of climate change on species from around the world, which taken together, provide compelling evidence that climate change is catastrophic for countless species.

Extinctions are becoming increasingly common on continents. While the vast majority of extinctions since 1500 AD have occurred on oceanic islands, continental extinctions are now as common as island extinctions. Roughly 50 percent of extinctions over the past 20 years occurred on continents.

Most threatened species occur in the tropics, especially on mountains and on islands. Most threatened birds, mammals, and amphibians are located in Central and South America, Africa south of the Sahara; and tropical South and Southeast Asia.

These realms contain the tropical and subtropical moist broad-leaf forests that are believed to harbour the majority of the earth’s living terrestrial and freshwater species.

Nevertheless, all this is threatened by man/woman.

“Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of man,” Revelation 13:18.

Happy First Fruits Festival (Matundaya Kwanza)

Source

International Union for Conservation of Nature(IUCN) 2007

(www.rastafarianperspectives.com or www.rastafari.co.zw)

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