The World Wildlife Fund’s (WWF) latest Living Planet Report 2024 indicates a catastrophic 73% average decline in monitored wildlife population between 1970 and 2020. The figure equates to an estimated 90% since 1900. Terrestrial as well as marine life continues to decline at a rate of 1% to 2% year on year.
The Potsdam Institute, as well as Plymouth Marine Laboratory, confirms that we passed the tipping point for ocean acidification in 2020. A high percentage of marine life is composed of aragonite and magnesium calcite, which will completely dissolve over the next 20 years as the pH drops to pH 7.95.
HNLC (high nutrient, low chlorophyll) or dead zones now cover 25% of all oceans and 83% of the Southern Ocean. HNLC zones continue to expand at a rate of 2% year on year. 50% of the world’s coral reefs have been lost, and the remaining 50% are under stress from pollution and climate disruption. It is estimated that 90% will be lost by 2050; 25% of all marine life in the world’s oceans depends upon coral.
The survival of nature and humanity depends upon maintaining high species diversity and ecosystem stability. Given the current rate of decline and that we have already passed the tipping point status, a trophic cascade ecosystem collapse will occur over the next 10 to 20 years.
The destruction of nature is simply, and very sadly, an existential threat to the survival of humanity unless urgent action is taken to reverse the decline. Climate disruption is linked to toxic forever chemical pollution and other biogenic factors which have been relatively overlooked or ignored in the search for solutions to climate disruption. Consequently, it is not possible to stop catastrophic climate disruption events.
In the meantime, we ‘neglected / ignored’ the opportunity to address the main threat to humanity, which is the loss of biodiversity on the land and in the sea. We stand like rabbits in the headlamps, suffering from baseline syndrome, while ecosystems silently move closer to collapse everywhere.
The attached report is a research proposal to test a possible solution that can be scaled up to a global level. The report is focused on an enclosed sea of Bocas del Toro in Panama, but it could equally be applied to the Marmaris Sea, Adriatic or the Baltic Sea as a test zone before global expansion.
https://lnkd.in/ev6_2cXN