Major developments are threatening two of the most diverse and stunning ecosystems in the world, the Amazon rainforest and the Bering sea. These diverse ecosystems supply many different functions to the planet, from storing carbon preventing it from being released into the atmosphere to containing the main source of food in a massive ecosystem food chain. These places need our help to maintain the strict regulation codes that protect them today. Read up below on how you can help.
The Amazon rainforest:
The Brazilian government is threatening to weaken the core legal protections for the Amazon, endangering one of the planet's most important ecosystems that helps balance our climate. In just the last year, nearly 3 million acres of rainforest in Brazil alone have been lost. Many of the protections won for the Amazon rely on Brazil's Forest Code. Right now, agribusiness is attempting to influence the Brazilian Congress to weaken the Forest Code. If that happens, we can expect a dramatic increase in deforestation rates, a significant loss of biodiversity, and a massive impact on global warming as carbon stored in the forest is released into the atmosphere.
Read more about it here: http://www.ipea.gov.br/pub/td/td0433.pdf
Alaska's Bering Sea:
It's been warned for years that the Bering Sea's pollock fishery - the world's largest - is suffering from overfishing. GreenPeace been called everything from crazy to exaggerating for making this claim about a fishery that has been held up as a model of sustainability. But news this month confirms their worst fears. The pollock population has plummeted by almost 50% in just one year. Pollock is the very foundation of the Bering Sea's food chain, feeding everything from the endangered Steller Sea Lion to fur seals. In fact, baby fur seals are already washing up dead in the Pribilof Islands, and scientists hypothesize that their deaths are caused by starvation.
**Reference: GreenPeace, http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/
Posts
0 comments:
Post a Comment