Biodiversity - Conservation, biodiversity sustainability environment issues, automated lobbying database at Information for Action

TIMELINE of HUMAN POPULATION GROWTH VS SPECIES LOSS
or HUMAN IMPACT UPON BIODIVERSITY
		World
YEARS AGO	REASON	Human Pop.	EXTINCTIONS
		(millions)
40,000 - 25,000	Ice age; hunting by humans		95% of megafauna in Australia and New Guinea

40,000 - 13,000	Hunting by humans		30 - 50% of megafauna ( large animals, birds, reptiles) in Europe, North Asia

20, 000 - 10,000	Hunting by humans		75% or 30 types of large mammals in North & South America

13,000	Agriculture	10	Wild gazelles in Fertile Crescent Area of Middle East

7,000 - 3,000	Hunting by humans	20	Giant ground sloths, monkeys and tortoises in Caribbean Is.

5,000	Hunting & agriculture		Dwarf megafauna including elephants in the Mediterranean Is.

3,500	Hunting	50	Mammoths in Siberian Arctic

1,500 - 200	Hunting	300	Moas and other large flightless birds in New Zealand.

1,000 - 200	Hunting	1000	Large birds, tortoises, lemurs small hippopotami in Madagascar

500 - 35	Spread of European colonisation		Decline of many species of fish, birds & mammals

35 - future	Overpopulation, globalisation	6000	3,000 species declined 40% from 1970 to 2000. .
			Species are going extinct at 1,000 times the natural or .
			backround rates typical of the Earth's past.
			Estimates 2 million to 10 million species of plants,
			animals and microorganisms are in the world today.

			The background rate of extinction has been one species every .
			4 years on average.

			Half of all species could become extinct in next 100 years;
			20% by 2022

			50% of all current species gone in 100 years. Probably
			10 million to 100 million species in the world.Could say 50 million
			Human-caused
			extinction now may be 120,000 times the background level.
			[this equates to 30,000 species per year].

			Norman Myers estimates 600 species are becoming extinct
			each week. Some say 1,000 - but no certainty.Myers thinks
			10 million species in the world, of which 600,000 lost since 1950.

			If tree felling continues at the rate of about 2% p.a., the
			world will lose 25% of all species by 2000 and another 33%
			in next 100 years.

			Number of species doubles with every ten-fold increase in area.
			Thus reverse can be applied

			Over one million species will be threatened with extinction by
			2050. Forecast range: minimum 18%, medium 24%, high 35%.

			Global diversity assessment of 1995: 13 million species, of which
			only 13% scientifically described. In coral reefs alone, 200,000
			species will die out in 40 years.

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By Rowland Benjamin

Information for Action