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Last Updated: Jul 2nd, 2008 - 21:15:22 |
We hear lots about biodiversity. However, do you know what it really means and why it is so important?
Biodiversity is the term that we use whenever we are describing the variety of life on Earth and the natural patterns of living and working together with these things. Biodiversity is the product of billions of years of evolution bringing together the world as we now know it. This forms the web of all existence upon which humans, plants and animals must depend in order to be able to survive.
There are approximately 1.75 million species of life on Earth today. These are mostly small creatures such as insects. In fact, there are between 13 and 100 million species of insects alive today, which creates a lot of diversity.
Of course, biodiversity also includes the genetic differences in species, such as can be found in the different varieties of the same crop. These differences are just as important as the differences that we see between 2 very different species.
Ecosystems are an important part of biodiversity because they allow communities of plants and animals to not only be able to form but to also be able to thrive. These creatures then interact with each other in ways that allow the ecosystem to sustain itself. The various ecosystems include deserts, oceans, rivers, forests, meadows and agricultural areas as well.
When all of the life forms on Earth are combined with these ecosystems, a unique habitat for humans is created. Herein it is important to understand that biodiversity protects us from catastrophes such as the Irish Potato Famine. It also helps us to be able to control the spread of disease by forcing viruses to adapt to other varieties of species.
Biodiversity plays an important role in providing food, shelter and medicine for humans and animals alike. Medicines are derived either directly or indirectly from biological sources. Many of them cannot be reproduced in a laboratory setting. There are still a lot of them that have not yet been explored for the possibility of producing new medicines. We also get commonly used building materials from biological sources and we have not yet explored all these possibilities either.
Humanity cannot live without biodiversity. Nor can many other species of life. This is because these things work together to create our ecosystem upon which we are dependent for life. Of course, it is also difficult to reproduce what it has taken nature billions of years to figure out how to do. For this reason, biodiversity is the cornerstone of Earth's survival.
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