A new report from WWF estimates that we have five years to plot a more sustainable course or face irreversible damage to our life-giving ecosystems.
Monitored wildlife populations have shrunk by 73pc in the last 50 years and nature is disappearing “at an alarming rate”, with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) warning there could be catastrophic consequences for humanity and most species without immediate and decisive action.
This stark news comes from WWF’s latest Living Planet Report published earlier this week. “Our natural world is in peril and the systems we depend on are rapidly deteriorating,” the report warns.
The WWF wildlife figures come from the Living Planet Index (LPI) which monitors 5,495 species of mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and fish. The LPI found that Latin America and the Caribbean suffered the fastest declines at 95pc, followed by Africa (76pc), and Asia and the Pacific (60pc).
There were less dramatic declines in North America (39pc) and Europe and Central Asia (35pc). Though the report states that these figures merely reflect the large-scale impacts on nature already apparent in those regions before the monitoring period started in 1970. “Some populations have stabilised or increased thanks to conservation efforts and species reintroduction,” the report notes, however.
Habitat degradation and loss driven mainly by our food systems, overexploitation, invasive species and disease are the biggest threats to species, with climate change and pollution also causing serious issues.
A decline in populations of wild species threatens the functioning of the ecosystem, the WWF warns. “This in turn undermines the benefits that ecosystems provide to people – from food, clean water and carbon storage for a stable climate to the broader contributions that nature makes to our cultural, social and spiritual wellbeing.”
‘A planet in crisis’
The report warns that nature is fast approaching tipping points, beyond which Earth’s life-support systems will be irreversibly damaged. These include the mass die-off of coral reefs, the destruction of the Amazon rainforest, the melting of the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets, and the thawing of permafrost in the Arctic and Russia.
Humanity, the report states, has five years to change course towards a sustainable trajectory before “nature degradation and climate change place us on the downhill slope of runaway tipping points”.
“It is no exaggeration to say that what happens in the next five years will determine the future of life on Earth.”
“Climate change and nature loss are propelling our planet towards dangerous and potentially irreversible tipping points, and these tipping points are directly linked to species decline and ecosystem degradation,” wrote director general of WWF International Kirsten Schuijt on LinkedIn.
The report calls for more joined-up thinking in tackling the interlinked climate and biodiversity crises. “Tackling the goals in a joined-up way opens up many potential opportunities to simultaneously conserve and restore nature, mitigate and adapt to climate change, and improve human wellbeing.”
It recommends a radical change to our food systems for more sustainable and equitable resource use, a faster transition to renewable energies and the redirecting of finance away from harmful activities towards nature-based solutions.
The WWF report comes out just a couple of weeks before the latest United Nations meeting on biodiversity is due to take place. At COP16, governments will review progress on the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, which was made at COP15 in 2022. This landmark agreement, which was signed by 188 countries and regions, aims to address biodiversity loss, restore ecosystems and protect indigenous rights, with a plan to protect 30pc of the Earth’s land, coastal areas and oceans, and reduce to near zero the loss of areas of high biodiversity importance by 2030.
The WWF report highlights that, as it stands, national climate commitments will lead to an average global temperature increase of almost 3 degrees Celsius, “inevitably triggering multiple catastrophic tipping points”. And national biodiversity strategies are “inadequate and lack financial and institutional support”, it says.
“Our planet is under strain, and the current responses from political decision-makers are insufficient to halt and reverse nature loss by 2030,” said Schuijt.
“The facts should cause alarm for all who care about the state of our natural world, and as we look towards global milestones like COP16, we stand at a critical crossroads where urgent decisions will determine our planet’s future.”
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