Why is biodiversity so important

Why is biodiversity important? Without biodiversity, our entire support system for human, as well as animal life, would collapse. We rely on nature to provide us with food and clean water, for a lot of medicines, and to prevent flooding and other extreme weather effects.

That is, of course, a terrifying prospect, but we really do need to tackle both. Why is it so important to not just stop, but to reverse biodiversity loss? We see these declines reflected in bird numbers, insect numbers, and so on. Another important issue is that of connectivity. Here's how.

Want a daily email of lesson plans that span all subjects and age groups? Learn more. Why is biodiversity so important? Jungles can become deserts, and reefs can become lifeless rocks. What makes one ecosystem strong and another weak in the face of change? Kim Preshoff details why the answer, to a large extent, is biodiversity. Learn More. Additional Resources for you to Explore.

How much biodiversity is in the rainforest? Interested now? Follow him on his journey through the Amazon. The plants need healthy soil to grow. Fungi help decompose organisms to fertilize the soil. Bees and other insects carry pollen from one plant to another, which enables the plants to reproduce. With less biodiversity, these connections weaken and sometimes break, harming all the species in the ecosystem…. Biodiversity is important to people in many ways. Plants, for instance, help humans by giving off oxygen.

They also provide food, shade, construction material, medicines, and fiber for clothing and paper. Increasingly, research on childhood exposure to nature suggests that early positive experiences may contribute to higher achievement in school, better physical fitness and lower rates of obesity, as well as reduced stress and greater self-confidence.

Helping people to understand what biodiversity loss means for them, and particularly for the health of their children, can be a very effective incentive for the positive behavioural change required to ensure more sustainable lifestyles and choices in energy, food and water consumption, which will in turn ease threats to biodiversity.

In order to provide more evidence on the links with biodiversity and health we should develop tools and methodologies to support the intersection of biodiversity and human health; study more closely environmentally-sensitive diseases in order to support more effective preventive public health strategies; and develop qualitative and quantitative research to explore the root causes of disease emergence and address how anthropogenic drivers of changes in biodiversity affect the transmission of human disease.

Habitat protection and restoration are highly beneficial public goods for which government investment is more than justified. Green new deals or stimulus packages provide an opportunity to acknowledge the close connections between people, nature and climate, and translate it into action to reduce nature-related risks.

This would lead to increasing protected areas of the planet, restoration of natural habitats, closure of illegal wildlife markets, changing consumption patterns to reduce the strain on nature, and setting targets to halve the impact of everything that the world produces and consumes. In turn, this would help to directly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase conservation of carbon sinks which also addresses climate change. A conversation with child health expert Dr.

Aaron Bernstein. Webinar Launch of a Manifesto for better children's data governance. What is biodiversity? Why is biodiversity important? What do we mean by biodiversity loss? How does biodiversity impact on children? Food Biodiversity is essential for healthy child nutrition and provides plant, animal and microbial genetic resources necessary for food production and diversified, balanced diets.