The video below is a new documentary compiled from lectures by William Rees, who is the co-creator of the Eco-Footprint concept. He is a Professor in the School of Community and Regional Planning at the University of British Columbia.
Dr. Rees has measured humanity’s use of the planet’s resources, and has concluded - not surprisingly - that humans are using more resources of the Pale Blue Dot than the planet can supply us with sustainably.
For more discussion by Dr. Rees of the issue of Ecological Footprints and their implications for the world follow this link
Here are some quotes from the link above:
Humankind now seems to be the victim of a global "catch-22" of its own making. More material growth, at least in the poor countries, seems essential for socioeconomic sustainability, yet any global increase in material throughput is ecologically unsustainable.
If just the present world population of 5.8 billion people were to live at current North American ecological standards (say 4.5 ha/person), a reasonable first approximation of the total productive land requirement would be 26 billion ha (assuming present technology). However, there are only just over 13 billion ha of land on Earth, of which only 8.8 billion are ecologically productive cropland, pasture, or forest (1.5 ha/person). In short, we would need an additional two planet Earths to accommodate the increased ecological load of people alive today. (Note the quotation above was written in 1994, the current world population is close to 7 billion people.)
Links
Follow this link for a Wikipedia article on Ecological Footprings
It is clear that we are seriously damaging our planet, the Pale Blue Dot. As shown here and here this damage is occurring in nine different ways. Although Climate Change is the one most discussed, biodiversity loss is also very impoatant, as the video below briefly explains:
Our society is embedded in an environment that provides a wide range of services that are very important in maintaining our communities and our lives. These are generally called ecoystem services, which can be divided into four main categories, as shown below:
Provisioning services
• food (including seafood and game), crops, wild foods, and spices • water • pharmaceuticals, biochemicals, and industrial products • energy (hydropower, biomass fuels)
Regulating services
• carbon sequestration and climate regulation • waste decomposition and detoxification • purification of water and air • crop pollination • pest and disease control
Supporting services
• nutrient dispersal and cycling • seed dispersal • Primary production
One of the many websites that I regularly read is Conservationbytes written by Corey J.A. Bradshore. Bradshore has dedicated his "site to highlighting, discussing and critiquing the science of conservation that has demonstrated measurable, positive effects for global biodiversity".
Bradshore published the following talk on the web site. The first few minutes discuss the video at the top of this post.
As the reality and dangers of biodiversity loss became increasingly evident an international response was clearly required. Consequently the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA) was launched in 2001. The MA has produced a range of technical reports which are summarised in the Living Beyond Our Means report.
The key messages of the report are:
■ Everyone in the world depends on nature and ecosystem services to provide the conditions for a decent, healthy, and secure life. ■ Humans have made unprecedented changes to ecosystems in recent decades to meet growing demands for food, fresh water, fiber, and energy. ■ These changes have helped to improve the lives of billions, but at the same time they weakened nature’s ability to deliver other key services such as purification of air and water, protection from disasters, and the provision of medicines. ■ Among the outstanding problems identified by this assessment are the dire state of many of the world’s fish stocks; the intense vulnerability of the 2 billion people living in dry regions to the loss of ecosystem services, including water supply; and the growing threat to ecosystems from climate change and nutrient pollution. ■ Human activities have taken the planet to the edge of a massive wave of species extinctions, further threatening our own well-being. ■ The loss of services derived from ecosystems is a significant barrier to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals to reduce poverty, hunger, and disease. ■ The pressures on ecosystems will increase globally in coming decades unless human attitudes and actions change. ■ Measures to conserve natural resources are more likely to succeed if local communities are given ownership of them, share the benefits, and are involved in decisions. ■ Even today’s technology and knowledge can reduce considerably the human impact on ecosystems. They are unlikely to be deployed fully, however, until ecosystem services cease to be perceived as free and limitless, and their full value is taken into account. ■ Better protection of natural assets will require coordinated efforts across all sections of governments, businesses, and international institutions. The productivity of ecosystems depends on policy choices on investment, trade, subsidy, taxation, and regulation, among others.
The report contains the following graphic illustrating the services provided by nine ecosystems. Click on the graphic for a larger and clearer view.
1. The living world is crucially important to our health
2. We generally undervalue the importance living world to our health
3. We need to do a better job of valuing the natural world
We know little about life on Earth, we know perhaps one in five of all species alive today. The most rich and diverse group of organisms we cannon directly see - the microbial world. We are losing species today at a rate not seen in 65 million years. The asteroid impact 65 million years age meant that 50% of all species went extince at that time, it took several million years for those species to come back. Today we are losing species at the same rate. By the most conservative of estimates we expect to lose between 1/3 to 1/2 of all species by the end of this century. The two leading drivers of the species loss are habitat loss and climate change. We are clearly doing very little to reverse the trend of biodiversity loss.
Our health in every concievable way depends on the health of the living world.
How does our health depend on nature?
Drugs
Two thirds of new drugs come from natural sources, one third are synthesised in the baboratory. Of the 100 most preoscribed drugs in the world, 50 are derived from natural products.
One instructive example is the Pacific Yew tree. This tree had been seen as totally worthless and was felled and discarded by loggers in their desire to get at the pine trees in northern forests. Taxol, a very important anti-cancer drug was found in Pacific Yew tree leaves and bark in a study designed to find bioactive molecules. Taxol is very difficult to synthesise in the laboratory. We still use Yew tree needles to create Taxol in a proces that combines natural and
