In the CI News (13 May) Sue Ngatokorua described a new bird on Mangaia, and the author suggested it might be a Chestnut-breasted Mannikin. In late May Peter Ngatokorua, who provided the original information for the news article, took Ian Karika and the author to see the birds in Vaitate swamp, and they were confirmed as Chestnut-breasted Mannikins. Groups of up to 30 were seen, and the population might be near 100.
Peter and others had concluded that the bird arrived naturally, because arrival of any cagebird would have sent the inevitable buzz-of-curiosity throughout the Mangaian community. To honour the birds' great flight to Mangaia, Peter had suggested it be called Toa Kere-ā-Rangi, literally "mighty warrior of Rangi". While other Vaitate planters suggest it should be named Pātiki-‘Enua-ō-Rangi, an alternate name for Vaitate district, where it was first seen in 1999.
Its history in Polynesia
The Chestnut-breasted Mannikin is a native bird of coastal northern and eastern Australia, southward to around Sydney. As a cagebird it was introduced to Tahiti in the late 1800s, where it escaped and naturalised, and gradually spread to a few other islands in the Society Group. The mannikin was not seen on Rimatara during the bird survey by the Natural Heritage Trust in 1992, while during the June 2000 expedition with WWF they were seen several times feeding in small flocks along the sides of roads. In 2000, people on Rimatara said that the mannikin had arrived naturally in the mid-1990s from Rurutu, where they thought it had been introduced from Tahiti – date unknown.
The mannikin is not wild on Rarotonga or any other island in the Southern Group. It is therefore most likely that the original Mangaia mannikins flew from Rimatara (530km) or from Rurutu (680km). Such an event might have been triggered and aided by the high winds of a large storm, and Rimatara and Mangaia may have got their stragglers or "mighty warriors" in the same event. This species is not recorded as a cagebird on Rarotonga, and there are no cagebirds on Mangaia, which makes it extremely unlikely that they were imported to Mangaia unnoticed.
Native or Introduced?
In the Cook Islands Biodiversity Database plants and animals are classified according to how they arrived as: Native (or Indigenous), for species arriving without human assistance; and Introduced for those arriving with the intentional or accidental assistance of people. Is the Chestnut-breasted Mannikin native or introduced on Mangaia? Considering that it is a native of Australia and that it was introduced to Tahiti as a cagebird it is an introduced bird of French Polynesia. And despite its magnificent flight from Rimatara or Rurutu to Mangaia, it should still be classified as an introduced bird.
Harmful or not?
Introduced plants and animals are also known as alien species, and those that harm local biodiversity are known as invasive alien species. Is the Chestnut-breasted Mannikin an invasive alien species, which should be eradicated?
The mannikin is the only bird on Mangaia feeding on grass seeds and Giant Bulrush ( Raupo ) seeds, and it is therefore not competing against native birds for food. The Cook Islands Reed-warber ( Kereārako ), which is often seen near and among the mannikins, is feeding on insects. There has been no reported die-off of native birds on Rimatara or Mangaia, which means the mannikin is not spreading any virulent bird disease that would be harmful to our native birds.
It is concluded that the Chestnut-breasted Mannikin is doing no particular harm, and that it is a welcome, attractive, and interesting addition to the biodiversity of Mangaia. It is likely that it will eventually fly the 250km to Rarotonga.
Description
The Chestnut-breasted Mannikin (Lonchura castaneothorax) is a small, reddish-brown finch with a black face, and a chestnut breast separated by a black line from a white belly. It is only 11cm long. Adult males and females are very similar, although the male has brighter colours. Only the male gives the high-pitched tit-tit-tit call. The young are mainly dull brown and grey.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Biodiversity Partnership:Invasive Species
Invasive Species
The spread of non-native or "exotic" species has emerged in recent years as one of the most serious threats to biodiversity, undermining the ecological integrity of many native habitats and pushing some rare species to the edge of extinction.
The greatest threats are posed by a relative handful of exotic species that have invasive tendencies and provide no benefit to humans. Described by some as a form of biological pollution, these species have been introduced -- sometimes by accident, but often with the best of intentions -- into systems where they thrive at the expense of native species. Some introduced species simply out-compete native plants and animals for space, food, or water. Others may also fundamentally alter natural disturbance regimes and other ecological processes, making it difficult or impossible for native species to survive.
Within their natural range, populations of most plants and animals are limited by competition, predation, and disease. Most introduced species confront the same kinds of biological and physical limitations in their new habitats, but those that have invasive tendencies and are not too limited by natural controls can spread rapidly, with dramatic, adverse ecological and economic impacts.
About 15 percent of the estimated 6,000-plus non-native plant and animal species in the United States cause severe economic or ecological impacts, according to the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment (1993).
Impacts of non-native species on biodiversity are more difficult to quantify but are clearly substantial. Exotic species have been implicated in the decline of 42 percent of the species listed for protection under the federal Endangered Species Act (The Nature Conservancy 1996).
Once established, many exotic species are virtually impossible to eradicate. Biological controls may offer hope in some cases, but many of the invasive exotics now found in the United States are probably here to stay. As a result, land managers struggle just to limit their further spread.
The best option for combating invasive exotics is to prevent them from being introduced in the first place. Early detection may allow eradication before they become fully established. However, simply getting rid of an invasive exotic may not be enough. If no action is taken to restore native species and ecosystems and to prevent future introductions, native species and ecological communities will remain vulnerable to re-invasion or to other new pests.
The spread of non-native or "exotic" species has emerged in recent years as one of the most serious threats to biodiversity, undermining the ecological integrity of many native habitats and pushing some rare species to the edge of extinction.
The greatest threats are posed by a relative handful of exotic species that have invasive tendencies and provide no benefit to humans. Described by some as a form of biological pollution, these species have been introduced -- sometimes by accident, but often with the best of intentions -- into systems where they thrive at the expense of native species. Some introduced species simply out-compete native plants and animals for space, food, or water. Others may also fundamentally alter natural disturbance regimes and other ecological processes, making it difficult or impossible for native species to survive.
Within their natural range, populations of most plants and animals are limited by competition, predation, and disease. Most introduced species confront the same kinds of biological and physical limitations in their new habitats, but those that have invasive tendencies and are not too limited by natural controls can spread rapidly, with dramatic, adverse ecological and economic impacts.
About 15 percent of the estimated 6,000-plus non-native plant and animal species in the United States cause severe economic or ecological impacts, according to the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment (1993).
Impacts of non-native species on biodiversity are more difficult to quantify but are clearly substantial. Exotic species have been implicated in the decline of 42 percent of the species listed for protection under the federal Endangered Species Act (The Nature Conservancy 1996).
Once established, many exotic species are virtually impossible to eradicate. Biological controls may offer hope in some cases, but many of the invasive exotics now found in the United States are probably here to stay. As a result, land managers struggle just to limit their further spread.
The best option for combating invasive exotics is to prevent them from being introduced in the first place. Early detection may allow eradication before they become fully established. However, simply getting rid of an invasive exotic may not be enough. If no action is taken to restore native species and ecosystems and to prevent future introductions, native species and ecological communities will remain vulnerable to re-invasion or to other new pests.
Biodiversity at the Crossroads
With species extinction accelerating at an ever increasing pace—as many as 10,000 species are now lost annually by some counts—biodiversity's biggest champion, world-renowned Harvard scientist E. O. Wilson, is stepping up efforts to raise public awareness of this issue and is hoping that politicians are listening.
Interviewed in November 1999 by ES&T, Wilson urges formation of a new environmental ethic, one that looks beyond mere consumption and economic security to real quality-of-life issues, in which preservation of biodiversity is given top-level priority. Noting science and technology's crucial role in solving food supply problems of the world's burgeoning population, he encourages companies to take more responsibility for protecting the environment, rather than just ensuring that new biological strains of agricultural foodstuffs are safe. He also admonishes politicians and the media for failing to recognize the importance of biodiversity and the need for carrying all species through the human bottleneck of overpopulation and environmental degradation.
A scientist extraordinaire, Wilson is an accomplished biologist, naturalist, environmentalist, ecologist, entomologist, and zoologist. He is credited with being the first to bring awareness of biodiversity issues to mainstream audiences. After earning his bachelor's and master's degrees in biology from the University of Alabama, Wilson went on to Harvard University, where, again in the field of biology, he received his Ph.D. His curriculum vitae reads like a virtual Who's Who among scientists. Highlights include two Pulitzer Prizes for general nonfiction; the 1990 Crafoord Prize, ecology's Nobel Prize; numerous positions on the advisory boards of major museums, environmental organizations, and scientific committees; and publication of more than 350 scientific articles. Although now retired from teaching, Wilson still serves as a research professor and an honorary curator in entomology at Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology.
Not mentioned in his résumé, but certainly true: Wilson is courageous.
You have written that “the loss of genetic and species diversity … is the folly our descendants are least likely to forgive us.” What will our descendants see that will lead them to prioritize this happenstance highest on their list of unforgiven ills?
We still haven't woken to the fact that while all the changes in the environment having to do with pollution, ozone depletion, and global warming are vitally important, they can be reversed, while on the other hand, species extinction, the loss of biodiversity, cannot be reversed. You could have climate, the atmosphere, and the world's resources all regulated for the use of a sustainable population of people, but you never will recover the loss of fauna and flora. We are not deliberately trying to wipe out the Creation, but we are, by general agreement among experts on biodiversity, heading toward extinction of as many as 20% of species in the next 30 years.
Why do I and other ecologists consider that unforgivable? Because each species is a masterpiece of evolution and, depending on the species, has been evolving into its present state for some thousands to tens of millions of years. The average life span of a species before humanity came along was between half a million years in mammals and, in some groups like the insects, 10 million years. To wipe out species at the rate we are now inflicting has been to increase the extinction rate by between a hundred and a thousand times.
By impoverishing the planet of life forms, we also reduce the productivity and stability of natural ecosystems. For example, imagine a forest consisting of one species, which is almost the case in some of our towns that are completely planted in one of several species of ornamental tree. And then imagine, as has happened over and over again, for example, with the American chestnut, elm, and hemlock, that you have a plague of insects or fungi capable of wiping out the entire population. If there are a hundred species of trees, a dozen species could be extinguished and still a beautiful forest would be standing. So stability, for the very preservation of some of the natural habitats, depends upon diversity.
What we lose in terms of natural products through the extinction of the species that uniquely produced them is extraordinary. A wondrous example of this is a substance discovered here at Harvard from a small tree collected in Sarawak, at the northern end of Borneo. Random screening of Calophyllum lanigerum revealed a substance that is completely effective against the AIDS virus. Upon closer study, the substance proved to be an inhibitor of reverse transcriptase, which stops reproduction of the AIDS virus in its tracks. When collectors were sent back to get more samples, the tree was gone; the forest around it had been cut over, and it took a long search to find other specimens of this rather rare tree. This substance never would have been discovered if the species had been extinguished completely, and it easily could have been extinguished before anyone did that survey.
Another example has to do with what we call ecosystems services. We need healthy, natural ecosystems with the biodiversity in them, as independently operating units, for holding and cleaning water in watersheds, soil renewal, and even the manufacture of the very air we breathe. In addition, we need them as carbon sinks to slow down the accumulation of greenhouse gases.
All of this should be kept in mind when we talk about why it matters that we have so many species.
What do you see as the most difficult environmental problems we face as we head into the new millennium?
That's easy. Land degradation and the loss of irreplaceable, nonrenewable natural resources, including the natural environment, by the combination of continued population growth and the drive of people everywhere to increase their consumption and, with it, their quality of life.
At the present time, the ecological footprint—the amount of productive land used per capita for food production, water and waste management, habitation, transportation, and other necessities—for the United States is about 12 acres. In developing countries, it's about 1 acre. So, with 80% of the world's population in the developing countries and virtually all of the projected population growth over the next few decades occurring there, the pressures upon the earth's resources and its flora and fauna are going to be enormous because these people are understandably anxious to increase their ecological footprint.
It is difficult to see how science and technology can see us through the difficulties created by population growth and environmental change. The great task of the 21st century is going to be to use as much of our ingenuity and resources in science and technology to get us through the bottleneck to the other side, where populations will have leveled off and begun to decline worldwide, without wrecking the planet in the process. Right now, the pressure being exerted in developing countries, where most of the world's biodiversity is located—as for example, in the tropical rain forests—is so intense as to have initiated mass extinction in order to allow increasing consumption by the burgeoning population.
We need to identify the world's conservation hot spots and go all out to save them. Hot spots are those natural environments that have the largest number of plants and animals found nowhere else and are themselves endangered. For example, Hawaii is one of the hottest spots in the world, with the highest rates of extinction as well as the greatest endangerment of plant and animal species. Other notorious hot spots include Madagascar, Ecuador's mountain forests, Brazil's Atlantic Forest, the Western Ghats of India, the forest on the southern slopes of the Himalayas, and now, increasingly, coral reefs in most parts of the world. The magnitude of the catastrophe has been measured, and there's nothing to be gained anymore by just wringing one's hands. We have to devise a strategy for the next century that can pull us through the bottleneck, and that will depend on the full engagement of the best we have to offer in science and technology. It's also going to have to involve a shift of world opinion away from purely econometric measures of success and progress, toward an environmental ethic that says what really counts is quality of life for all generations to come, above and beyond exclusively bottom-line consumption and economic security.
Do you have faith that the application of science and technology will prove an adequate remedy?
Yes. It's got to. The stakes are too high. Can we do it? There's a certain level of urgency, when one says, 'Yes, because we have no other choice,' and that is truly our current circumstance.
What positive movement have you seen with regard to increased scientific study of biodiversity, incorporation of biodiversity issues in economic development, curbing human population growth, and educating people to the value of biodiversity as a solution in turning around species extinction?
Countries are now setting a few areas of the world aside—where forests and other habitats were being wiped out and large numbers of species along with them—particularly, in the developing world where it's most needed. These countries signed on to the 1992 Earth Summit Convention on Biological Diversity. As a result of government intervention, the destruction is beginning to slow down—for example, in Brazil's Atlantic Forest. Also, in Brazil recently, a substantial amount of the Pantenal, the South American equivalent of the Everglades with a magnificently rich diversity of organisms, was purchased and set aside in a reserve. So bits and pieces around the world are being saved, but it's still far below what's needed—even below the 3% or 4% of the surface of the land composing the most important hot spots.
As for education, it's still entirely inadequate worldwide, even in this country, where awareness of the biodiversity crisis has been slowly spreading. Unfortunately, even though Al Gore, the environmentally best informed political leader in history, is among the front-runners in the presidential race, the issue of biodiversity and even the environment generally have not yet (as we speak) appeared on the radar screen.
Concerning preservation of biodiversity, is gene patenting part of the solution or part of the problem?
It's a potential problem, but it's certainly also, when handled right, a big part of the solution. Pharmaceutical companies have been slow to screen and make use of natural products because of fear of not being able to secure patent rights, because theoretically, or I should say legally, a natural product is not patentable. It takes an enormous amount of money to find, perfect, test, and market a new pharmaceutical. Unless you have iron-clad guarantees on the patent, it's a risky venture economically. It would be unfortunate to depend solely on the synthesis of new pharmaceuticals from the ground up, because millions of organisms have been in an arms race with one another for hundreds of millions of years, slugging it out with bacteria and developing all sorts of anticancer materials and other defensive substances by Darwinian trial and error. Each one is a potential pharmacopoeia of materials waiting to be discovered. For example, insects, which are the dominant and most diverse creatures on the land around the world, are surely loaded with substances of this kind, yet they have scarcely been looked at by government or commercial laboratories.
What's your opinion about biotechnological applications in the area of plant engineering as to their effect on biodiversity?
Here, I may run into trouble with some of my colleagues, but I'm all for biotechnology. We need all the science and technology we can get to sustain both humanity and the natural world. We need to push bioengineering to the limit in creating more productive crops, particularly crops that can live in already devastated, soil-impoverished environments, low-diversity saline environments, and other biologically marginal land where productivity can be increased to the maximum allowed by photosynthetic potential and with a minimal effect on biodiversity. We absolutely must increase the world food supply. Bioengineering is the best hope now of increasing the productivity of existing crops and agricultural lands, and if done right, it can take pressure off the remaining natural environments.
But is this technology something we might live to regret?
The risk involved, of course, is that new life forms can be created that penetrate and endanger natural ecosystems, or they may transfer their genes to natural species in ways that help lead to their extinction. But so far, there has been very little sign that this is a general risk. Intact, healthy, natural ecosystems are hard to penetrate, even by natural species introduced as invasive forms from other countries. Moreover, the production and use of newly engineered life forms can be monitored and regulated in much the same way that we monitor and regulate forms created by conventional breeding, and, in a different area, the way new drugs are tested for side effects before they become generally available to the public. The side effects that may produce newly engineered forms are indeed a risk, but I don't see them as a very large risk at this point. In any case, it's one worth taking, given the benefits and our ability (and responsibility) to monitor each situation and regulate it.
What ethical considerations should we be pondering as this technology moves forward?
I think there's a very strong moral argument to be made for getting the maximum gains possible through bioengineering, and as a result, increasing food production and creating new pharmaceuticals and other products.
But there is an equally strong moral argument to be made for protecting all the biodiversity we can. It seems to me that the research laboratories in companies at the cutting edge of this new technology should have as part of their standard practice a strong environmental program. They should not just be satisfied with ensuring that new biological strains are safe, but also take a proactive role in helping to preserve the natural environment. That is, they should have an ancillary stewardship role as part of their ethical policy. That, I believe, is something that's not too hard to sell, particularly as the mood shifts toward a more conservation-based environmental ethic worldwide. Corporate leaders, who will be judged accordingly, will want to play a prominent role.
How big, in your opinion, do land and marine reserves need to be to preserve all the world's biodiversity?
As big as we can manage to make them. I'll tell you why. As you reduce the size of a reserve, or any habitat, you automatically reduce the number of species that can live sustainably on that reserve. The amount of reduction is roughly the following: A 90% reduction in area eventually results in a 50% decrease in the number of species. Although it may take a number of years, it still happens very rapidly in ecological time.
You can see this principle illustrated in the national parks of the western United States and Canada, where the number of mammal species, which can be easily monitored, has been declining steadily and most rapidly in the smallest reserves. Tragically, we'll always lose species. It's part of the mission of conservation biology to figure out the designs and exchange of fauna and flora, recovery and enlargement of natural reserves, to lose as few as possible, and to keep as much biodiversity as possible. As a matter of principle, we must always try for large reserves.
We've been hearing a lot about looming global water shortages in the coming decades as a result of inefficient irrigation systems, population growth, and groundwater depletion. How do you see this problem affecting species diversity, particularly aquatic species, as more water is diverted from rivers to sustain growing population centers?
Desperate. Natural resource experts agree that the major environmental constraints of the future are two in number: arable land, which has been dropping per capita for over 40 years, and available freshwater.
The groundwater in most parts of the world is dropping. In some parts, a good part of the American plains, for example, it is dropping drastically. The result is that aquatic biodiversity—comprising freshwater fish, a vast array of freshwater insects, turtles, mollusks, and so on—has been the most damaged in the United States and elsewhere in the world. It has the highest extinction rate worldwide and the greatest level of endangerment.
In what ways might governments and citizens be persuaded to do more to protect biodiversity?
Education, education, education. To that end, what we need are more public philosophers, government advisors, and media people with a scientific background, or at least enough knowledge of biodiversity, so it comes into focus for them, and therefore for their audiences. This has been a major failure of the media in this country, particularly in presenting key scientific issues. It is scandalous in the case of biodiversity. I don't know how this could be done, exactly—bringing our Anthony Lewises and George Wills, for example, around to seeing the importance of these issues.
How can you interest the public? Granted there's nothing duller than river pollution. But it's different with vanishing ecosystems and species. We need to dramatize the real biodiversity issues of the world better because it's not getting across to Joe Sixpack as to why any of this matters. Unfortunately, as far as Congress is concerned, and forgive me, no senator's spouse has ever died because of an extinct species, unlike heart disease or cancer. It's not something that comes home, particularly to opinion makers and our leaders, in a personal way so as to inspire a commitment.
We haven't heard Al Gore, for example, say 'I come from a state that has lost dozens of species of freshwater mollusks. Our splendid and ancient heritage is threatened. I care about this.' We haven't heard any political leader talk like that. Of course, I don't expect them to do so immediately, because the climate is not right for this type of presentation. But what we need is the beginnings of an environmental ethic that can reach into the public discourse, and an ethic depends on education.
How can international institutions aid in this effort?
They're vital. In fact, today some of the very best work is being done by international nongovernmental organizations. They've raised hundreds of millions of dollars, and they are actually in the field, the hot spots, among the people who live there in the developing countries especially, working to the limit of their ability. They include Conservation International, World Wildlife Fund (U.S.); the Worldwide Fund for Nature (international); the World Conservation Union; and the Nature Conservancy. I realize I'm leaving out other organizations like the Sierra Club, which are certainly very effective at the national level, but not on the global scale that these others are.
And then there are other institutions like the Museum of Natural History in London, the American Museum of Natural History in New York, and the New York Botanical Garden, which have very vigorous programs on biodiversity research and education. They're also having a very important effect. The fact that I'm on the boards of directors of three of them is something of a conflict of interest, but even if I'd been thrown out years ago, I'd still say it: These are the ones that are right at the top in terms of effectiveness.
Do you think recent efforts by the National Science Foundation (Environ. Sci. Technol. 1999, 33 (9), 188A) and EPA (Environ. Sci. Technol. 1999, 33 (13), 276A-279A) to do more multidisciplinary research, and view ecosystems as a whole, is a step in the right direction?
Yes, it is just that NSF is underfunded, but I give a lot of credit to it, including its present director, Rita Colwell, who has considerable vision and foresight. But clearly, given the political situation in this country and the lack of awareness among the electorate of environmental problems, especially biodiversity, we are not likely to see the kinds of federal support needed—and nowhere near that given for biomedicine.
We're going to have to depend a lot more on the nongovernmental organizations, including those I just mentioned, for that kind of effort, along with involvement by corporations and wealthy private supporters. Among the latter has been Ted Turner, and in the realm of conservation more strictly, Gordon Moore, the founder of Intel. Moore has contributed very substantially and usefully to the world—supporting just the kind of research and field programs that are the most effective in global conservation. One person like that, with the stroke of a pen, can sometimes do more good than the entire federal government. That's the way the world works right now. In fact, it's heartening, and we should make the most of it.
In your book Consilience, you propose unifying all the major branches of knowledge, in effect, combining sociology, economics, the arts, and religion under the umbrella of science. What does your ideal curriculum look like for students in the 21st century?
Let me say right away that I'm not exactly urging unification; I'm reporting that it is happening and urging that it be speeded up. The idea of consilience has great importance for higher education and for future scholarship. The social sciences, by general agreement, are far weaker than they should be for the problems that they're supposed to solve. In my opinion, the major reason for that inadequacy is that they lack a foundation of the kind that biology has in chemistry and chemistry has in physics. Natural science is now completely consilient, from subatomic particles to ecosystems.
Clearly, the foundation of the social sciences, which actually deal with the workings of the human mind and social institutions, is biology. In Consilience, I argue that the rapid advance of three fields of science has made the connection between biology and the social sciences more realistic. It's beginning to happen. Those three fields are cognitive science, often known as the brain sciences; human genetics—now we call it human genomics, because we're presently dealing with the entire genome; and evolutionary biology, especially sociobiology, sometimes called evolutionary psychology, which is becoming more successful in tracing the likely origins of human social instinct and explaining its significance.
Do you advocate a more expanded curriculum in institutions of higher learning or do you lean toward a more open, free exchange among specialists?
I think one of the real benefits of universal consilience, which is a hierarchically arranged webwork of cause-and-effect explanation, is the renaissance of general education—what is often called the liberal arts. And that's the notion of teaching— from high school on, but especially at the college level—a core curriculum, a common body of knowledge that consists of a clear statement of the world's problems and the search for meaning in life.
Even when scholars and teachers disagree about consilience, their discussion of it raises the issues that count in intellectual growth such as: Can we really have a scientific explanation of the mind? Will it be possible to restructure economics to take into account human instinct as disclosed by psychology and evolutionary biology? Will the origins of ethics and religion be illuminated? These are key questions, and scientists tend to say yes, yes, yes to them. Some social scientists and humanities scholars agree, but a lot still say no, no, no; this is reductionism taken too far. It's not going to work; the great branches of learning will stand on their own.
Well, maybe the critics are right—although, of course, I don't think so. But the point is that just by having the matter focused in this way, you're calling the attention of students and the general public to the exciting frontiers of science and scholarship most likely to shape their lives. And furthermore, you are resuming an examination of the great questions of the human condition: What is the meaning of human existence? Why are we here? Questions long ago abandoned by the philosophers are now being picked up as a franchise by the natural sciences.
How might this consilience approach provide solutions to our environmental problems?
I think in many ways. First of all, environmental problems are not going to be solved without the full engagement of the very best the intellect can give. The social sciences, in particular, are going to live in a dreamworld as far as the environment is concerned until they become linked more solidly to biology—not just the biology of the mind and a realistic view of the human condition, but biology that includes studies of the environment. In other words, the real world.
Interviewed in November 1999 by ES&T, Wilson urges formation of a new environmental ethic, one that looks beyond mere consumption and economic security to real quality-of-life issues, in which preservation of biodiversity is given top-level priority. Noting science and technology's crucial role in solving food supply problems of the world's burgeoning population, he encourages companies to take more responsibility for protecting the environment, rather than just ensuring that new biological strains of agricultural foodstuffs are safe. He also admonishes politicians and the media for failing to recognize the importance of biodiversity and the need for carrying all species through the human bottleneck of overpopulation and environmental degradation.
A scientist extraordinaire, Wilson is an accomplished biologist, naturalist, environmentalist, ecologist, entomologist, and zoologist. He is credited with being the first to bring awareness of biodiversity issues to mainstream audiences. After earning his bachelor's and master's degrees in biology from the University of Alabama, Wilson went on to Harvard University, where, again in the field of biology, he received his Ph.D. His curriculum vitae reads like a virtual Who's Who among scientists. Highlights include two Pulitzer Prizes for general nonfiction; the 1990 Crafoord Prize, ecology's Nobel Prize; numerous positions on the advisory boards of major museums, environmental organizations, and scientific committees; and publication of more than 350 scientific articles. Although now retired from teaching, Wilson still serves as a research professor and an honorary curator in entomology at Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology.
Not mentioned in his résumé, but certainly true: Wilson is courageous.
You have written that “the loss of genetic and species diversity … is the folly our descendants are least likely to forgive us.” What will our descendants see that will lead them to prioritize this happenstance highest on their list of unforgiven ills?
We still haven't woken to the fact that while all the changes in the environment having to do with pollution, ozone depletion, and global warming are vitally important, they can be reversed, while on the other hand, species extinction, the loss of biodiversity, cannot be reversed. You could have climate, the atmosphere, and the world's resources all regulated for the use of a sustainable population of people, but you never will recover the loss of fauna and flora. We are not deliberately trying to wipe out the Creation, but we are, by general agreement among experts on biodiversity, heading toward extinction of as many as 20% of species in the next 30 years.
Why do I and other ecologists consider that unforgivable? Because each species is a masterpiece of evolution and, depending on the species, has been evolving into its present state for some thousands to tens of millions of years. The average life span of a species before humanity came along was between half a million years in mammals and, in some groups like the insects, 10 million years. To wipe out species at the rate we are now inflicting has been to increase the extinction rate by between a hundred and a thousand times.
By impoverishing the planet of life forms, we also reduce the productivity and stability of natural ecosystems. For example, imagine a forest consisting of one species, which is almost the case in some of our towns that are completely planted in one of several species of ornamental tree. And then imagine, as has happened over and over again, for example, with the American chestnut, elm, and hemlock, that you have a plague of insects or fungi capable of wiping out the entire population. If there are a hundred species of trees, a dozen species could be extinguished and still a beautiful forest would be standing. So stability, for the very preservation of some of the natural habitats, depends upon diversity.
What we lose in terms of natural products through the extinction of the species that uniquely produced them is extraordinary. A wondrous example of this is a substance discovered here at Harvard from a small tree collected in Sarawak, at the northern end of Borneo. Random screening of Calophyllum lanigerum revealed a substance that is completely effective against the AIDS virus. Upon closer study, the substance proved to be an inhibitor of reverse transcriptase, which stops reproduction of the AIDS virus in its tracks. When collectors were sent back to get more samples, the tree was gone; the forest around it had been cut over, and it took a long search to find other specimens of this rather rare tree. This substance never would have been discovered if the species had been extinguished completely, and it easily could have been extinguished before anyone did that survey.
Another example has to do with what we call ecosystems services. We need healthy, natural ecosystems with the biodiversity in them, as independently operating units, for holding and cleaning water in watersheds, soil renewal, and even the manufacture of the very air we breathe. In addition, we need them as carbon sinks to slow down the accumulation of greenhouse gases.
All of this should be kept in mind when we talk about why it matters that we have so many species.
What do you see as the most difficult environmental problems we face as we head into the new millennium?
That's easy. Land degradation and the loss of irreplaceable, nonrenewable natural resources, including the natural environment, by the combination of continued population growth and the drive of people everywhere to increase their consumption and, with it, their quality of life.
At the present time, the ecological footprint—the amount of productive land used per capita for food production, water and waste management, habitation, transportation, and other necessities—for the United States is about 12 acres. In developing countries, it's about 1 acre. So, with 80% of the world's population in the developing countries and virtually all of the projected population growth over the next few decades occurring there, the pressures upon the earth's resources and its flora and fauna are going to be enormous because these people are understandably anxious to increase their ecological footprint.
It is difficult to see how science and technology can see us through the difficulties created by population growth and environmental change. The great task of the 21st century is going to be to use as much of our ingenuity and resources in science and technology to get us through the bottleneck to the other side, where populations will have leveled off and begun to decline worldwide, without wrecking the planet in the process. Right now, the pressure being exerted in developing countries, where most of the world's biodiversity is located—as for example, in the tropical rain forests—is so intense as to have initiated mass extinction in order to allow increasing consumption by the burgeoning population.
We need to identify the world's conservation hot spots and go all out to save them. Hot spots are those natural environments that have the largest number of plants and animals found nowhere else and are themselves endangered. For example, Hawaii is one of the hottest spots in the world, with the highest rates of extinction as well as the greatest endangerment of plant and animal species. Other notorious hot spots include Madagascar, Ecuador's mountain forests, Brazil's Atlantic Forest, the Western Ghats of India, the forest on the southern slopes of the Himalayas, and now, increasingly, coral reefs in most parts of the world. The magnitude of the catastrophe has been measured, and there's nothing to be gained anymore by just wringing one's hands. We have to devise a strategy for the next century that can pull us through the bottleneck, and that will depend on the full engagement of the best we have to offer in science and technology. It's also going to have to involve a shift of world opinion away from purely econometric measures of success and progress, toward an environmental ethic that says what really counts is quality of life for all generations to come, above and beyond exclusively bottom-line consumption and economic security.
Do you have faith that the application of science and technology will prove an adequate remedy?
Yes. It's got to. The stakes are too high. Can we do it? There's a certain level of urgency, when one says, 'Yes, because we have no other choice,' and that is truly our current circumstance.
What positive movement have you seen with regard to increased scientific study of biodiversity, incorporation of biodiversity issues in economic development, curbing human population growth, and educating people to the value of biodiversity as a solution in turning around species extinction?
Countries are now setting a few areas of the world aside—where forests and other habitats were being wiped out and large numbers of species along with them—particularly, in the developing world where it's most needed. These countries signed on to the 1992 Earth Summit Convention on Biological Diversity. As a result of government intervention, the destruction is beginning to slow down—for example, in Brazil's Atlantic Forest. Also, in Brazil recently, a substantial amount of the Pantenal, the South American equivalent of the Everglades with a magnificently rich diversity of organisms, was purchased and set aside in a reserve. So bits and pieces around the world are being saved, but it's still far below what's needed—even below the 3% or 4% of the surface of the land composing the most important hot spots.
As for education, it's still entirely inadequate worldwide, even in this country, where awareness of the biodiversity crisis has been slowly spreading. Unfortunately, even though Al Gore, the environmentally best informed political leader in history, is among the front-runners in the presidential race, the issue of biodiversity and even the environment generally have not yet (as we speak) appeared on the radar screen.
Concerning preservation of biodiversity, is gene patenting part of the solution or part of the problem?
It's a potential problem, but it's certainly also, when handled right, a big part of the solution. Pharmaceutical companies have been slow to screen and make use of natural products because of fear of not being able to secure patent rights, because theoretically, or I should say legally, a natural product is not patentable. It takes an enormous amount of money to find, perfect, test, and market a new pharmaceutical. Unless you have iron-clad guarantees on the patent, it's a risky venture economically. It would be unfortunate to depend solely on the synthesis of new pharmaceuticals from the ground up, because millions of organisms have been in an arms race with one another for hundreds of millions of years, slugging it out with bacteria and developing all sorts of anticancer materials and other defensive substances by Darwinian trial and error. Each one is a potential pharmacopoeia of materials waiting to be discovered. For example, insects, which are the dominant and most diverse creatures on the land around the world, are surely loaded with substances of this kind, yet they have scarcely been looked at by government or commercial laboratories.
What's your opinion about biotechnological applications in the area of plant engineering as to their effect on biodiversity?
Here, I may run into trouble with some of my colleagues, but I'm all for biotechnology. We need all the science and technology we can get to sustain both humanity and the natural world. We need to push bioengineering to the limit in creating more productive crops, particularly crops that can live in already devastated, soil-impoverished environments, low-diversity saline environments, and other biologically marginal land where productivity can be increased to the maximum allowed by photosynthetic potential and with a minimal effect on biodiversity. We absolutely must increase the world food supply. Bioengineering is the best hope now of increasing the productivity of existing crops and agricultural lands, and if done right, it can take pressure off the remaining natural environments.
But is this technology something we might live to regret?
The risk involved, of course, is that new life forms can be created that penetrate and endanger natural ecosystems, or they may transfer their genes to natural species in ways that help lead to their extinction. But so far, there has been very little sign that this is a general risk. Intact, healthy, natural ecosystems are hard to penetrate, even by natural species introduced as invasive forms from other countries. Moreover, the production and use of newly engineered life forms can be monitored and regulated in much the same way that we monitor and regulate forms created by conventional breeding, and, in a different area, the way new drugs are tested for side effects before they become generally available to the public. The side effects that may produce newly engineered forms are indeed a risk, but I don't see them as a very large risk at this point. In any case, it's one worth taking, given the benefits and our ability (and responsibility) to monitor each situation and regulate it.
What ethical considerations should we be pondering as this technology moves forward?
I think there's a very strong moral argument to be made for getting the maximum gains possible through bioengineering, and as a result, increasing food production and creating new pharmaceuticals and other products.
But there is an equally strong moral argument to be made for protecting all the biodiversity we can. It seems to me that the research laboratories in companies at the cutting edge of this new technology should have as part of their standard practice a strong environmental program. They should not just be satisfied with ensuring that new biological strains are safe, but also take a proactive role in helping to preserve the natural environment. That is, they should have an ancillary stewardship role as part of their ethical policy. That, I believe, is something that's not too hard to sell, particularly as the mood shifts toward a more conservation-based environmental ethic worldwide. Corporate leaders, who will be judged accordingly, will want to play a prominent role.
How big, in your opinion, do land and marine reserves need to be to preserve all the world's biodiversity?
As big as we can manage to make them. I'll tell you why. As you reduce the size of a reserve, or any habitat, you automatically reduce the number of species that can live sustainably on that reserve. The amount of reduction is roughly the following: A 90% reduction in area eventually results in a 50% decrease in the number of species. Although it may take a number of years, it still happens very rapidly in ecological time.
You can see this principle illustrated in the national parks of the western United States and Canada, where the number of mammal species, which can be easily monitored, has been declining steadily and most rapidly in the smallest reserves. Tragically, we'll always lose species. It's part of the mission of conservation biology to figure out the designs and exchange of fauna and flora, recovery and enlargement of natural reserves, to lose as few as possible, and to keep as much biodiversity as possible. As a matter of principle, we must always try for large reserves.
We've been hearing a lot about looming global water shortages in the coming decades as a result of inefficient irrigation systems, population growth, and groundwater depletion. How do you see this problem affecting species diversity, particularly aquatic species, as more water is diverted from rivers to sustain growing population centers?
Desperate. Natural resource experts agree that the major environmental constraints of the future are two in number: arable land, which has been dropping per capita for over 40 years, and available freshwater.
The groundwater in most parts of the world is dropping. In some parts, a good part of the American plains, for example, it is dropping drastically. The result is that aquatic biodiversity—comprising freshwater fish, a vast array of freshwater insects, turtles, mollusks, and so on—has been the most damaged in the United States and elsewhere in the world. It has the highest extinction rate worldwide and the greatest level of endangerment.
In what ways might governments and citizens be persuaded to do more to protect biodiversity?
Education, education, education. To that end, what we need are more public philosophers, government advisors, and media people with a scientific background, or at least enough knowledge of biodiversity, so it comes into focus for them, and therefore for their audiences. This has been a major failure of the media in this country, particularly in presenting key scientific issues. It is scandalous in the case of biodiversity. I don't know how this could be done, exactly—bringing our Anthony Lewises and George Wills, for example, around to seeing the importance of these issues.
How can you interest the public? Granted there's nothing duller than river pollution. But it's different with vanishing ecosystems and species. We need to dramatize the real biodiversity issues of the world better because it's not getting across to Joe Sixpack as to why any of this matters. Unfortunately, as far as Congress is concerned, and forgive me, no senator's spouse has ever died because of an extinct species, unlike heart disease or cancer. It's not something that comes home, particularly to opinion makers and our leaders, in a personal way so as to inspire a commitment.
We haven't heard Al Gore, for example, say 'I come from a state that has lost dozens of species of freshwater mollusks. Our splendid and ancient heritage is threatened. I care about this.' We haven't heard any political leader talk like that. Of course, I don't expect them to do so immediately, because the climate is not right for this type of presentation. But what we need is the beginnings of an environmental ethic that can reach into the public discourse, and an ethic depends on education.
How can international institutions aid in this effort?
They're vital. In fact, today some of the very best work is being done by international nongovernmental organizations. They've raised hundreds of millions of dollars, and they are actually in the field, the hot spots, among the people who live there in the developing countries especially, working to the limit of their ability. They include Conservation International, World Wildlife Fund (U.S.); the Worldwide Fund for Nature (international); the World Conservation Union; and the Nature Conservancy. I realize I'm leaving out other organizations like the Sierra Club, which are certainly very effective at the national level, but not on the global scale that these others are.
And then there are other institutions like the Museum of Natural History in London, the American Museum of Natural History in New York, and the New York Botanical Garden, which have very vigorous programs on biodiversity research and education. They're also having a very important effect. The fact that I'm on the boards of directors of three of them is something of a conflict of interest, but even if I'd been thrown out years ago, I'd still say it: These are the ones that are right at the top in terms of effectiveness.
Do you think recent efforts by the National Science Foundation (Environ. Sci. Technol. 1999, 33 (9), 188A) and EPA (Environ. Sci. Technol. 1999, 33 (13), 276A-279A) to do more multidisciplinary research, and view ecosystems as a whole, is a step in the right direction?
Yes, it is just that NSF is underfunded, but I give a lot of credit to it, including its present director, Rita Colwell, who has considerable vision and foresight. But clearly, given the political situation in this country and the lack of awareness among the electorate of environmental problems, especially biodiversity, we are not likely to see the kinds of federal support needed—and nowhere near that given for biomedicine.
We're going to have to depend a lot more on the nongovernmental organizations, including those I just mentioned, for that kind of effort, along with involvement by corporations and wealthy private supporters. Among the latter has been Ted Turner, and in the realm of conservation more strictly, Gordon Moore, the founder of Intel. Moore has contributed very substantially and usefully to the world—supporting just the kind of research and field programs that are the most effective in global conservation. One person like that, with the stroke of a pen, can sometimes do more good than the entire federal government. That's the way the world works right now. In fact, it's heartening, and we should make the most of it.
In your book Consilience, you propose unifying all the major branches of knowledge, in effect, combining sociology, economics, the arts, and religion under the umbrella of science. What does your ideal curriculum look like for students in the 21st century?
Let me say right away that I'm not exactly urging unification; I'm reporting that it is happening and urging that it be speeded up. The idea of consilience has great importance for higher education and for future scholarship. The social sciences, by general agreement, are far weaker than they should be for the problems that they're supposed to solve. In my opinion, the major reason for that inadequacy is that they lack a foundation of the kind that biology has in chemistry and chemistry has in physics. Natural science is now completely consilient, from subatomic particles to ecosystems.
Clearly, the foundation of the social sciences, which actually deal with the workings of the human mind and social institutions, is biology. In Consilience, I argue that the rapid advance of three fields of science has made the connection between biology and the social sciences more realistic. It's beginning to happen. Those three fields are cognitive science, often known as the brain sciences; human genetics—now we call it human genomics, because we're presently dealing with the entire genome; and evolutionary biology, especially sociobiology, sometimes called evolutionary psychology, which is becoming more successful in tracing the likely origins of human social instinct and explaining its significance.
Do you advocate a more expanded curriculum in institutions of higher learning or do you lean toward a more open, free exchange among specialists?
I think one of the real benefits of universal consilience, which is a hierarchically arranged webwork of cause-and-effect explanation, is the renaissance of general education—what is often called the liberal arts. And that's the notion of teaching— from high school on, but especially at the college level—a core curriculum, a common body of knowledge that consists of a clear statement of the world's problems and the search for meaning in life.
Even when scholars and teachers disagree about consilience, their discussion of it raises the issues that count in intellectual growth such as: Can we really have a scientific explanation of the mind? Will it be possible to restructure economics to take into account human instinct as disclosed by psychology and evolutionary biology? Will the origins of ethics and religion be illuminated? These are key questions, and scientists tend to say yes, yes, yes to them. Some social scientists and humanities scholars agree, but a lot still say no, no, no; this is reductionism taken too far. It's not going to work; the great branches of learning will stand on their own.
Well, maybe the critics are right—although, of course, I don't think so. But the point is that just by having the matter focused in this way, you're calling the attention of students and the general public to the exciting frontiers of science and scholarship most likely to shape their lives. And furthermore, you are resuming an examination of the great questions of the human condition: What is the meaning of human existence? Why are we here? Questions long ago abandoned by the philosophers are now being picked up as a franchise by the natural sciences.
How might this consilience approach provide solutions to our environmental problems?
I think in many ways. First of all, environmental problems are not going to be solved without the full engagement of the very best the intellect can give. The social sciences, in particular, are going to live in a dreamworld as far as the environment is concerned until they become linked more solidly to biology—not just the biology of the mind and a realistic view of the human condition, but biology that includes studies of the environment. In other words, the real world.
Perempuan Kuanoel Melawan Perusahaan Tambang
30 Orang siswi Santa Maria melakukan ekspedisi Kali Surabaya Minggu 12 Agustus 2007 dengan didampingi oleh Martinus Eko, Lucia Dewi Nusantara dan Kepala Sekolah SMP Santa Maria Suster Nurwindi OSU.
Ekspedisi yang dimulai pukul 07.30 WIB dari bawah jembatan Tol Gunung Sari memantau kualitas air Kali Surabaya pada musim kemarau. Dari hasil penelusuran selama hampir 6 jam hingga pukul 13.00 WIB peserta Ekspedisi menemukan beberapa fakta yang mencemaskan di Kali Surabaya
1. Buangan industri yang melampaui batas ketentuan, Adanya beberapa industri yang membuang limbah cairnya ke Kali Surabaya yang menimbulkan perubahan fisik sungai, pada pengamatan kali ini siswi mengukur kualitas TDS (Total Dissolved Solid) padatan terlarut dalam air, dalam pemantauannya siswi Santa Maria mengukur kadar TDS dari buangan PT Surabaya Agung Kertas Tbk di Desa Driyorejo hasilnya TDS mencapai 923-986 ppm, padahal menurut EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) TDS buangan limbah tak boleh melebihi 500 ppm. Tingginya TDS ini menunjukkan bahwa dalam limbah cair yang dibuang mengandung ion-ion logam berat dan padatan tersuspensi seperti zat-zat kimia berbahaya.
2. Ancaman degradasi kualitas kesehatan masyarakat, Aktivitas manusia seperti mandi, cuci Kakus di Sepanjang bantaran Kali Surabaya merupakan kondisi yang mengkhawatirkan karena kualitas air Kali Surabaya yang telah dinyatakan tercemar. Pemanfaatan air sungai bagi masyarakat bantaran akan dikhawatirkan akan membawa dampak menurunya kualitas kesehatan warga yang tinggal dibantaran dan memanfaatkan air kali Surabaya
3. Sungai menjadi Tempat sampah, dimanfaatkannya sungai menjadi tempat sampah, disepanjang pengamatan banyak dijumpai tumpukan sampah ditepi-tepi sungai, bahkan tak jarang peserta ekspedisi menemukan bangkai binatang mengapung disungai
4. Penurunan kualitas air Kali Surabaya, siswi peserta EKspedisi ini juga melakukan pengukuran kandungan Oksigen terlarut dalam air (DO/Dissolved Oxygen) dari pengukuran yang dilakukan daru Hulu ke Hilir dari Wilayah Gresik, Sidoarjo hingga Surabaya maka disimpulkan bahwa kandungan Oksigen mengalami penurunan dari hulu menuju hilir. Di daerah hulu (Driyorejo dan Cangkir) Kadar DO mencapai 6-7 mg/L, didaerah Bambe/Kali Tengah turun hingga 1,3 mg/L dan didaerah hilir (Kedurus dan Gunungsari) Kadar DO melorot manjadi 1-3 mg/L, Turunya kadar DO ini kemungkinan besar disebabkan tingginya aktivitas manusia disekitar bantaran dan meningkatnya volume buangan limbah cair ke Kali Surabaya sehingga Oksigen menjadi habis terkuras untuk menguraikan bahan pencemar, selain itu Bulan Agustus ini Kali Surabaya mengalami penurunan debit air sehingga aktivitas pengenceran juga mengalami pengurangan
5. Ancaman kepunahan Biota Air, dalam ekspedisi ini tim Detektif SMP Santa Maria melakukan inventarisasi biota air yang ada di tepian dinding dan dasar sungai yang menemukan bahwa di daerah hilir dasar sungainya hanya dipenuhi cacing sedangkan dikawasan hulu Kali Surabaya masih banyak dijumpai beragam jenis biota dasar seperti Family Odonata (Keluarga Capung), udang air tawar, Kerang air tawar, ikan kuthuk
Dari hasil penemuan ini Kelompok Detektif SMP Santa Maria akan melakukan penelitian lebih detail.
Menurut Martinus Eko pembimbing KIR SMP SANTA MARIA mereka akan membagi siswi dalam 4 kelompok dengan focus kajian/penelitian yang berbeda dengan mengangkat masalah Kali Surabaya.
?Masalah Kali Surabaya menurut kami adalah hal yang serius Karena Kali Surabaya adalah sumber kehidupan bagi warga kota Surabaya, maka kami akan berusaha untuk memberikan sumbang saran untuk mencari solusi bagi masalah pencemaran yang terjadi di Kali Surabaya,?Ujar Martinus Eko. Lebih lanjuat ia menyatakan bahwa seminggu ini akan dirumuskan pokok kajiannya sedangkan untuk dua minggu kedepan kelompok KIR SMP Santa Maria akan kembali melakukan ekspedisi ke Kali Surabaya.
Kegiatan ini didampingi oleh Lembaga Kajian Ekologi dan Konservasi Lahan Basah ecoton, tim yang mendampingi Andreas Agus Kristanto Nugroho dan Amiruddin Mutaqien ST.
Ekspedisi yang dimulai pukul 07.30 WIB dari bawah jembatan Tol Gunung Sari memantau kualitas air Kali Surabaya pada musim kemarau. Dari hasil penelusuran selama hampir 6 jam hingga pukul 13.00 WIB peserta Ekspedisi menemukan beberapa fakta yang mencemaskan di Kali Surabaya
1. Buangan industri yang melampaui batas ketentuan, Adanya beberapa industri yang membuang limbah cairnya ke Kali Surabaya yang menimbulkan perubahan fisik sungai, pada pengamatan kali ini siswi mengukur kualitas TDS (Total Dissolved Solid) padatan terlarut dalam air, dalam pemantauannya siswi Santa Maria mengukur kadar TDS dari buangan PT Surabaya Agung Kertas Tbk di Desa Driyorejo hasilnya TDS mencapai 923-986 ppm, padahal menurut EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) TDS buangan limbah tak boleh melebihi 500 ppm. Tingginya TDS ini menunjukkan bahwa dalam limbah cair yang dibuang mengandung ion-ion logam berat dan padatan tersuspensi seperti zat-zat kimia berbahaya.
2. Ancaman degradasi kualitas kesehatan masyarakat, Aktivitas manusia seperti mandi, cuci Kakus di Sepanjang bantaran Kali Surabaya merupakan kondisi yang mengkhawatirkan karena kualitas air Kali Surabaya yang telah dinyatakan tercemar. Pemanfaatan air sungai bagi masyarakat bantaran akan dikhawatirkan akan membawa dampak menurunya kualitas kesehatan warga yang tinggal dibantaran dan memanfaatkan air kali Surabaya
3. Sungai menjadi Tempat sampah, dimanfaatkannya sungai menjadi tempat sampah, disepanjang pengamatan banyak dijumpai tumpukan sampah ditepi-tepi sungai, bahkan tak jarang peserta ekspedisi menemukan bangkai binatang mengapung disungai
4. Penurunan kualitas air Kali Surabaya, siswi peserta EKspedisi ini juga melakukan pengukuran kandungan Oksigen terlarut dalam air (DO/Dissolved Oxygen) dari pengukuran yang dilakukan daru Hulu ke Hilir dari Wilayah Gresik, Sidoarjo hingga Surabaya maka disimpulkan bahwa kandungan Oksigen mengalami penurunan dari hulu menuju hilir. Di daerah hulu (Driyorejo dan Cangkir) Kadar DO mencapai 6-7 mg/L, didaerah Bambe/Kali Tengah turun hingga 1,3 mg/L dan didaerah hilir (Kedurus dan Gunungsari) Kadar DO melorot manjadi 1-3 mg/L, Turunya kadar DO ini kemungkinan besar disebabkan tingginya aktivitas manusia disekitar bantaran dan meningkatnya volume buangan limbah cair ke Kali Surabaya sehingga Oksigen menjadi habis terkuras untuk menguraikan bahan pencemar, selain itu Bulan Agustus ini Kali Surabaya mengalami penurunan debit air sehingga aktivitas pengenceran juga mengalami pengurangan
5. Ancaman kepunahan Biota Air, dalam ekspedisi ini tim Detektif SMP Santa Maria melakukan inventarisasi biota air yang ada di tepian dinding dan dasar sungai yang menemukan bahwa di daerah hilir dasar sungainya hanya dipenuhi cacing sedangkan dikawasan hulu Kali Surabaya masih banyak dijumpai beragam jenis biota dasar seperti Family Odonata (Keluarga Capung), udang air tawar, Kerang air tawar, ikan kuthuk
Dari hasil penemuan ini Kelompok Detektif SMP Santa Maria akan melakukan penelitian lebih detail.
Menurut Martinus Eko pembimbing KIR SMP SANTA MARIA mereka akan membagi siswi dalam 4 kelompok dengan focus kajian/penelitian yang berbeda dengan mengangkat masalah Kali Surabaya.
?Masalah Kali Surabaya menurut kami adalah hal yang serius Karena Kali Surabaya adalah sumber kehidupan bagi warga kota Surabaya, maka kami akan berusaha untuk memberikan sumbang saran untuk mencari solusi bagi masalah pencemaran yang terjadi di Kali Surabaya,?Ujar Martinus Eko. Lebih lanjuat ia menyatakan bahwa seminggu ini akan dirumuskan pokok kajiannya sedangkan untuk dua minggu kedepan kelompok KIR SMP Santa Maria akan kembali melakukan ekspedisi ke Kali Surabaya.
Kegiatan ini didampingi oleh Lembaga Kajian Ekologi dan Konservasi Lahan Basah ecoton, tim yang mendampingi Andreas Agus Kristanto Nugroho dan Amiruddin Mutaqien ST.
Perdagangan Satwa Liar Ancam Kekayaan Fauna Indonesia
Diperkirakan sebanyak 300.000 jenis satwa liar atau sekitar 17% satwa di dunia terdapat di Indonesia, walaupun luas Indonesia hanya 1,3% dari luas daratan dunia. Indonesia nomer satu dalam hal kekayaan mamalia (515 jenis) dan menjadi habitat dari sekitar 1539 jenis burung. Sebanyak 45% ikan di dunia, hidup di Indonesia.
Meskipun kaya, namun Indonesia dikenal juga sebagai negara yang memiliki daftar panjang tentang satwa liar yang terancam punah. Saat ini jumlah jenis satwa liar Indonesia yang terancam punah adalah 147 jenis mamalia, 114 jenis burung, 28 jenis reptil, 91 jenis ikan dan 28 jenis invertebrata (IUCN, 2003). Satwa-satwa tersebut benar-benar akan punah dari alam jika tidak ada tindakan untuk menyelamatkanya.
Perdagangan satwa liar menjadi ancaman serius bagi kelestarian satwa liar Indonesia. Lebih dari 95% satwa yang dijual di pasar adalah hasil tangkapan dari alam, bukan hasil penangkaran. Lebih dari 20% satwa yang dijual di pasar mati akibat pengangkutan yang tidak layak. Berbagai jenis satwa dilindungi dan terancam punah masih diperdagangkan secara bebas di Indonesia. Semakin langka satwa tersebut semakin mahal pula harganya.
Beberapa fakta lain:
Sebanyak 40% satwa liar yang diperdagangkan mati akibat proses penangkapan yang menyakitkan, pengangkutan yang tidak memadai, kandang sempit dan makanan yang kurang. Perdagangan satwa liar itu adalah kejam!
60% mamalia yang diperdagangkan di pasar burung adalah jenis yang langka dan dilindungi undang-undang. Perdagangan satwa liar itu adalah tindakan kejahatan!
70% primata dan kakatua yang dipelihara masyarakat menderita penyakit dan penyimpangan perilaku. Banyak dari penyakir yang diderita satwa itu bisa menular ke manusia.
Lebih dari 100.000 burung paruh bengkok setiap tahunnya ditangkap dari alam Papua dan Maluku. Penangkapan ini juga melibatkan oknum militer. Sebagian besar burung tersebut adalah ditangkap secara ilegal dari alam.
Burung paruh bengkok (nuri dan kakatua) ditangkap dari alam dengan cara-cara yang menyiksa dan menyakitkan satwa. Bulunya dicabuti agar tidak bisa terbang.
Setiap tahunnya ada sekitar 1000 ekor orangutan Kalimantan yang diselundupkan ke Jawa dan juga luar negeri. Sebagian besar orangutan yang diperdagangkan adalah masih bayi. Untuk menangkap seekora bayi orangutan, pemburu harus membunuh induk orangutan itu yang akan mempertahankan anaknya sampai mati.
Sekitar 3000 owa dan siamang setiap tahunnya diburu untuk diperdagangkan di dalam negeri dan diselundupkan ke luar negeri.
PERDAGANGAN SATWA DILINDUNGI ITU ADALAH
KEJAM (Cruel)
KEJAHATAN (Crime)
NO KONSERVASI (No Conservation)
Meskipun kaya, namun Indonesia dikenal juga sebagai negara yang memiliki daftar panjang tentang satwa liar yang terancam punah. Saat ini jumlah jenis satwa liar Indonesia yang terancam punah adalah 147 jenis mamalia, 114 jenis burung, 28 jenis reptil, 91 jenis ikan dan 28 jenis invertebrata (IUCN, 2003). Satwa-satwa tersebut benar-benar akan punah dari alam jika tidak ada tindakan untuk menyelamatkanya.
Perdagangan satwa liar menjadi ancaman serius bagi kelestarian satwa liar Indonesia. Lebih dari 95% satwa yang dijual di pasar adalah hasil tangkapan dari alam, bukan hasil penangkaran. Lebih dari 20% satwa yang dijual di pasar mati akibat pengangkutan yang tidak layak. Berbagai jenis satwa dilindungi dan terancam punah masih diperdagangkan secara bebas di Indonesia. Semakin langka satwa tersebut semakin mahal pula harganya.
Beberapa fakta lain:
Sebanyak 40% satwa liar yang diperdagangkan mati akibat proses penangkapan yang menyakitkan, pengangkutan yang tidak memadai, kandang sempit dan makanan yang kurang. Perdagangan satwa liar itu adalah kejam!
60% mamalia yang diperdagangkan di pasar burung adalah jenis yang langka dan dilindungi undang-undang. Perdagangan satwa liar itu adalah tindakan kejahatan!
70% primata dan kakatua yang dipelihara masyarakat menderita penyakit dan penyimpangan perilaku. Banyak dari penyakir yang diderita satwa itu bisa menular ke manusia.
Lebih dari 100.000 burung paruh bengkok setiap tahunnya ditangkap dari alam Papua dan Maluku. Penangkapan ini juga melibatkan oknum militer. Sebagian besar burung tersebut adalah ditangkap secara ilegal dari alam.
Burung paruh bengkok (nuri dan kakatua) ditangkap dari alam dengan cara-cara yang menyiksa dan menyakitkan satwa. Bulunya dicabuti agar tidak bisa terbang.
Setiap tahunnya ada sekitar 1000 ekor orangutan Kalimantan yang diselundupkan ke Jawa dan juga luar negeri. Sebagian besar orangutan yang diperdagangkan adalah masih bayi. Untuk menangkap seekora bayi orangutan, pemburu harus membunuh induk orangutan itu yang akan mempertahankan anaknya sampai mati.
Sekitar 3000 owa dan siamang setiap tahunnya diburu untuk diperdagangkan di dalam negeri dan diselundupkan ke luar negeri.
PERDAGANGAN SATWA DILINDUNGI ITU ADALAH
KEJAM (Cruel)
KEJAHATAN (Crime)
NO KONSERVASI (No Conservation)
Monday, August 27, 2007
Air travel poses major threat to biodiversity, say scientists
Global air travel has become one of the greatest threats to biodiversity and public health by driving the spread of alien species and infectious diseases to new habitats, scientists report today.
The explosive growth of worldwide airlines has seen passenger numbers rise 8% a year in the past three years, creating travel networks that link remote and isolated ecosystems for the first time, boosting the spread of micro-organisms and insects to unprecedented levels, the scientists claim. The introduction of insects and other organisms from foreign regions has triggered ecological disasters around the globe. Many have no natural predators and thrive at the expense of native species which have not had time to evolve defences against the invaders.
Researchers at Oxford University analysed records for more than 3m scheduled flights between 3,570 airports around the world between May 2005 and April 2006 and calculated the most heavily-used routes. They then overlaid global climate maps, revealing the times of year different parts of the world experienced the best conditions for alien species to survive. By combining the information Andrew Tatem and Simon Hay at the university's spatial ecology and epidemiology group highlighted "invasion hotspots", the destinations most at risk from insects and micro-organisms being carried into the countries throughout the year.
The scientists found that the greatest threat to any country occurred from June to August, when many regions experienced similar climatic conditions and passenger numbers peaked. But closer inspection revealed specific routes that were at high risk of transferring organisms between distant countries. In January the greatest risk to Britain and other parts of Europe was found to come from air travel links with east China and Japan, while in July the risk shifted to routes servicing the east coast of South America. The analysis showed that the isolated Hawaiian islands, widely regarded as suffering the worst ecological damage from invasive species, were at risk from several countries within the space of a few months, as the climate varied to match that of east Asia, Central America and the Caribbean.
The wide-ranging climate and large number of airports put the US at greatest risk, with eastern US airports strongly linked to Mediterranean and Asia airports in January, and west coast airports most at risk from incoming flights from the Middle East and southern Africa in April
The explosive growth of worldwide airlines has seen passenger numbers rise 8% a year in the past three years, creating travel networks that link remote and isolated ecosystems for the first time, boosting the spread of micro-organisms and insects to unprecedented levels, the scientists claim. The introduction of insects and other organisms from foreign regions has triggered ecological disasters around the globe. Many have no natural predators and thrive at the expense of native species which have not had time to evolve defences against the invaders.
Researchers at Oxford University analysed records for more than 3m scheduled flights between 3,570 airports around the world between May 2005 and April 2006 and calculated the most heavily-used routes. They then overlaid global climate maps, revealing the times of year different parts of the world experienced the best conditions for alien species to survive. By combining the information Andrew Tatem and Simon Hay at the university's spatial ecology and epidemiology group highlighted "invasion hotspots", the destinations most at risk from insects and micro-organisms being carried into the countries throughout the year.
The scientists found that the greatest threat to any country occurred from June to August, when many regions experienced similar climatic conditions and passenger numbers peaked. But closer inspection revealed specific routes that were at high risk of transferring organisms between distant countries. In January the greatest risk to Britain and other parts of Europe was found to come from air travel links with east China and Japan, while in July the risk shifted to routes servicing the east coast of South America. The analysis showed that the isolated Hawaiian islands, widely regarded as suffering the worst ecological damage from invasive species, were at risk from several countries within the space of a few months, as the climate varied to match that of east Asia, Central America and the Caribbean.
The wide-ranging climate and large number of airports put the US at greatest risk, with eastern US airports strongly linked to Mediterranean and Asia airports in January, and west coast airports most at risk from incoming flights from the Middle East and southern Africa in April
Controversial plan increases risks of flood, illegal logging and poaching of endangered species on Sumatra
The USA, Japan and the World Bank co-sponsored a meeting in Tokyo on December 3, 2002, to plan the rehabilitation and reconstruction of Aceh Province, Indonesia. Delegates from at least 23 countries planned to attend the meeting, intended to foster peace and prosperity in this region of rich biodiversity and rampant political corruption (see Jakarta Post article). One of the proposals to be discussed at the meeting is a major road network that could eventually lead to the destruction of all high biodiversity areas in Leuser Ecosystem, one of the most important conservation areas on Earth.
The abundant rainforests and beautiful rivers in the Leuser Ecosystem of Aceh are among the last refuges for such endangered species as Sumatran rhinos, tigers, orangutans, sun bears and elephants. Efforts are being made to propose the Leuser Ecosystem for nomination as a World Heritage Site. It is recognized as one of the top twenty-five critical ecosystems in the world.
Leuser Ecosystem also supports more than two million indigenous people. Current roads through Leuser have already led to uncontrolled illegal logging, triggering floods that, in turn, have caused major destruction of public infrastructure and loss of lives. After a meeting in Jakarta, Indonesia on November 26, 2002, the provincial government of Aceh got approval from the ministers of the central government to go ahead with the controversial road development plans known as "Ladia Galaska." An alliance of local NGO's in Indonesia has been formed to campaign against the new road projects in Leuser.
The roads in the Ladia Galaska proposal cut through conservation forests (including the designated Mount Leuser National Park) and 'protection forests' (generally, non-conservation forests that have an average slope of 40% or more). Local and provincial governments have ignored the legal requirements for environmental impact assessments, and have asked the central government to release funds for the roads. Proponents of Ladia Galaska rejected alternative proposals that would benefit more people. Many proponents are linked to logging businesses, and the alternative road schemes link up villages in non-forest areas.
Mr. Yarrow Robertson, who has been working to conserve the Leuser Ecosystem for years, said, "The effect of Ladia Galaska can be predicted because of precedents in Leuser. In 1982, USAID helped fund a road project that split the Mt. Leuser National Park in two. Aerial photographs taken before and after clearly show that USAID helped facilitate uncontrolled illegal settlements along the road inside the National Park."
Ms. Michelle Merrill, who is facilitating an online petition and letter writing campaign at http://www.duke.edu/~mym1/ladia_galaska.htm, added, "When I was in Leuser in 1999, the forest where I was studying orangutans was pillaged by illegal loggers. New road building through this supposedly protected ecosystem will only make the problem worse." Roberto Delgado, another orangutan researcher who worked in Leuser, said, "I read about this crazy road the other week and nearly started crying."
Since 1998, independent studies have consistently ranked Indonesia as one of the most corrupt countries in Southeast Asia. Recent reports have estimated that the military derives almost 70% of its operational revenue from non-budgetary sources, especially illegal logging, drugs, gambling and other protection rackets. In one incident, the regional military command in Medan operated a foundation that helped build a road used for illegal logging operations inside the National Park in Langkat. The permit was issued by the head of the National Park. Recently, top levels of the military have issued commands to all military units around Leuser to ensure that no military personnel are involved in illegal logging.
Mr. Robertson noted, "With enough pressure on [international] donors, they will put sufficient pressure on the Aceh provincial government, so they can decide what direction they want to take, and hopefully decide what's best for the majority of people of Aceh, not just those linked to logging businesses. We need this push now because if everyone were to lobby hard, we could prevent this certain destruction from happening."
The abundant rainforests and beautiful rivers in the Leuser Ecosystem of Aceh are among the last refuges for such endangered species as Sumatran rhinos, tigers, orangutans, sun bears and elephants. Efforts are being made to propose the Leuser Ecosystem for nomination as a World Heritage Site. It is recognized as one of the top twenty-five critical ecosystems in the world.
Leuser Ecosystem also supports more than two million indigenous people. Current roads through Leuser have already led to uncontrolled illegal logging, triggering floods that, in turn, have caused major destruction of public infrastructure and loss of lives. After a meeting in Jakarta, Indonesia on November 26, 2002, the provincial government of Aceh got approval from the ministers of the central government to go ahead with the controversial road development plans known as "Ladia Galaska." An alliance of local NGO's in Indonesia has been formed to campaign against the new road projects in Leuser.
The roads in the Ladia Galaska proposal cut through conservation forests (including the designated Mount Leuser National Park) and 'protection forests' (generally, non-conservation forests that have an average slope of 40% or more). Local and provincial governments have ignored the legal requirements for environmental impact assessments, and have asked the central government to release funds for the roads. Proponents of Ladia Galaska rejected alternative proposals that would benefit more people. Many proponents are linked to logging businesses, and the alternative road schemes link up villages in non-forest areas.
Mr. Yarrow Robertson, who has been working to conserve the Leuser Ecosystem for years, said, "The effect of Ladia Galaska can be predicted because of precedents in Leuser. In 1982, USAID helped fund a road project that split the Mt. Leuser National Park in two. Aerial photographs taken before and after clearly show that USAID helped facilitate uncontrolled illegal settlements along the road inside the National Park."
Ms. Michelle Merrill, who is facilitating an online petition and letter writing campaign at http://www.duke.edu/~mym1/ladia_galaska.htm, added, "When I was in Leuser in 1999, the forest where I was studying orangutans was pillaged by illegal loggers. New road building through this supposedly protected ecosystem will only make the problem worse." Roberto Delgado, another orangutan researcher who worked in Leuser, said, "I read about this crazy road the other week and nearly started crying."
Since 1998, independent studies have consistently ranked Indonesia as one of the most corrupt countries in Southeast Asia. Recent reports have estimated that the military derives almost 70% of its operational revenue from non-budgetary sources, especially illegal logging, drugs, gambling and other protection rackets. In one incident, the regional military command in Medan operated a foundation that helped build a road used for illegal logging operations inside the National Park in Langkat. The permit was issued by the head of the National Park. Recently, top levels of the military have issued commands to all military units around Leuser to ensure that no military personnel are involved in illegal logging.
Mr. Robertson noted, "With enough pressure on [international] donors, they will put sufficient pressure on the Aceh provincial government, so they can decide what direction they want to take, and hopefully decide what's best for the majority of people of Aceh, not just those linked to logging businesses. We need this push now because if everyone were to lobby hard, we could prevent this certain destruction from happening."
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