Let's have a little discussion about conservation

If I were to give a penny for the number of times I have seen folks carrying out wanton destructions of biological diversity, I would have gone totally bankrupt. Awareness has increased over the years about conserving nature, but very little has been achieved generally. Hopefully, humans would not end up rendering the planet inhabitable with their nonchalant attitudes towards conservation in the nearest future.

Conservation is about maintaining the biosphere as to ensure sustainable use of its resources. It simply means taking action to avoid species decline, extinction and permanent detrimental change to the environment. Achieving the aims and objectives of conservation requires that we a deep understanding of how the biosphere functions or properly put, how living organisms and the environment interact. In other words, I am saying the knowledge of ecology and other environmental sciences is quite essential in order to successfully carryout conservation.

^{CC BY-SA 3.0, Link}

Extinction of several plant and animal species have taken place as a result of direct or indirect actions of man. Wanton destruction of biodiversity has been carried out in the name of hunting, pollution of the environment through the actions of man has caused some irreversible damages to the biosphere; widespread use of pesticides, habitat fragmentation and loss, agricultural practices and so on are among the prime causes of species rarity and extinction during the last 400 years. There is considerable evidence that the rates of extinction of important plant and animal species have accelerated since the era of industrial revolution.

Previous researches has shown that extinction rates for birds and mammals are multiple times greater than their natural background rates. Many more species are becoming rare and their long-long term survival is in serious doubt. Rare species are typically becoming genetically eroded meaning that their gene pool is reducing and with it is their capacity to adapt to changes in their environment. Adverse turn in environmental conditions can and has actually been recorded to easily bring about the extinction of these rare species.

Biological diversity or biodiversity is the totality of species of plants and animals in the biosphere. It can however be viewed at a much smaller or larger scale. Efforts to conserve biodiversity may be channelled at conserving as much genetic diversity as possible within each species as insurance against future environmental disruptions or new human uses of them. Consequently, attention is focused on genetically distinct sub-populations or subspecies such as heavy metal tolerant strains of common grasses.

^{By Yathin S Krishnappa - CC BY-SA 3.0, Link}

In addition, biodiversity conservation can focus on phylogenetic distinctiveness to ensure that organisms with no close living relatives are conserved to aid scientist’s understanding of evolution or for their unique properties. On the other hands, focus might be channelled towards conserving biotic communities and ecosystems. The maintenance of representatives of the earth’s ecosystem would go a long way in ensuring the survival of plant and animal species.

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Why do we need to conserve biodiversity?

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Majority of scientists, especially life scientists believe there is an undeniable need to conserve wildlife and avert environmental degradation simply because the future existence of man depends on it. Interestingly, a few others have questioned the value of conservation. The financial resources committed to conservation of important species and establishment of protected areas has been challenged in several quarters. Policy decisions are overwhelmingly matters of economics and unfortunately, standard economics has failed to assign more than nominal value to the conservation of resources.

Developing a new system of economic policies favourable for conservation of biodiversity is an essential contemporary challenge, especially in the developing countries and some few developed countries of the world. The decision might be quite easy for species with blatant resource value such as crop plants or plants with known medicinal importance. The reverse is however the case for species with only indirect or intrinsic value as in the case of species that serve as tourist attraction or as part of landscape in National Parks or as an essential but unattractive decomposer organisms.

The various arguments used to drive efforts at conserving biodiversity are centred on the benefits accruable to humans through maintenance of full range of biodiversity and avoiding environmental degradation. Thus, species are conserved for ethical, aesthetic, utilitarian, ecological and or scientific research purposes.

^{By Mar11 - CC BY-SA 4.0, Link}

Starting with the last, it is not just the direct benefits of species and their genetic resources that are important to humans. The well-being of man is also dependent on the maintenance of a fully healthy and functional biosphere. Of particular importance are the various biogeochemical cycles of essential nutrient elements that constitute the biomolecules of life. Loss of vegetation cover can have serious consequences on soil erosion, watershed protection and so on leading to siltation of rivers and coast and may even result in changes in rainfall and climate patterns.

A lot of cultural traditions, religious beliefs, political persuasion and other similar concepts all shape the attitudes of man to nature. Some argue very strongly that nature does not exist simply for man to transform and modify as he pleases for his own purposes. They opine that all living species have a right to co-exist with humans on earth and man has no right to cause the extinction or to diminish the quality of life of any living organism. Closely linked with this is the concept of sustainability which challenges man to pass on to future generations all the diversity of life and quality of environment that he inherited.

Humans derive pleasure from natural environments and the presence of other living organisms. Little wonder that a lot of people would pay humongous fees just to watch nature at it best in various nature parks established around the world. The aesthetic purpose of conserving nature can be hard to measure objectively but it is undeniably true as shown by numerous local, national and international organisations that exist worldwide to promote wildlife and countryside conservation. Human’s appreciation of nature is reflected in their actions through arts, designs, literatures and music and thus influences our recreational pursuits. On a more personal note, I strongly believe that being in contact with nature plays an important part in the overall well-being of man.

^{By Ali A. Fazal, CC BY 2.5, Link}

Wildlife contributes to various immediate needs of man in many fundamental ways. Agriculture, forestry, fisheries and several other practices have supplied man with foods, industrial materials and medicines. Many plant species have important medical uses while animal studies have enabled man to understand and treat human diseases more effectively. Numerous industrial processes depend on plant and animal materials and increasingly, microorganisms are being used industrially in various manufacturing processes.

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Summary

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There is no doubt that man, through his direct and indirect actions has contributed more to extinction of several plant and animal species than natural processes. The overall well-being of man is hinged at healthy biosphere while the latter is only achievable by making effort to conserve the biological organisms as well as the environments within it.

Biodiversity conservation is quite essential and can be carried out at various levels such as genetic conservation, environment conservation, conservation of important species and so on. There are several important reasons to conserve biodiversity which include aesthetic, ethical, utility and most importantly, ecological reasons.

Thank you.

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References

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wikipedia

tandfonline

future.com

nature.com

ncbi

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