Biodiversity loss
also called biological diversity, is the variety of life found in a place on Earth or, often, the total variety of life on Earth. A common measure of this variety, called species richness, is the count of species in an area. There are several methods to account for the biological diversity in specific geographical areas.
Biodiversity also encompasses the genetic variety within each species and the variety of ecosystems that species create. Biodiversity can be measured by examining counts of species and comparing it in various places. Another method is to recognize the unique biodiversity of those habitats that contain few but unusual species. Examples of such habitats are for instance thermal vents, volcanos and hot springs.
Biodiversity
On average, there has been a large decline across tens of thousands of wildlife populations since 1970
Biodiversity loss results from the study and monitoring of animal populations. The concept of biodiversity loss can be translation into a single number by the Living Planet Index, which summarises the average change in population size of tens of thousands of studied animal populations.
It is important to note that this data is not globally representative, meaning that some regions will have more data available, due to research efforts and commitments. For example, biodiversity data is very limited in the tropics.
Biodiversity loss
The Living Planet Index reports the average decline in animal population sizes since 1970.
This does not tell us the:
Number of species lost;
Number of populations or individuals that have been lost;
Number or percentage of species or populations that are declining;
Number of species extinct.
Since 1970, the size of animal populations for which data is available have declined by 69%, on average (Cardinale et al., 2012). The decline depends on the species population in question, as some species are more vulnerable than others. Conservation efforts are also contributing to populations increasing in size in different areas of the world.
An assessment of the Red List of threatened species of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), identified that almost 1,000 species have been lost since the 1500s.
However there many species from diverse groups that have been evaluated on their extinction risk.
Biodiversity loss is intrinsically connected to habitat loss, and a recent study assessing the expansion of agricultural areas explores this relationship as seen in the image above.
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Additional resources
Websites
IUCN Red List of Threatened Species
National Parks & Wildlife Service
National Biodiversity Data Centre
Further readings