Millennium Ecosystem Assessment's Summary For Decision-Makers

 Kaplan University LaSharryon Davis SC250 Unit 6 Assignment What energy resources do you currently rely on in your everyday life? On the daily basis I use numerous energy resources from residential, commercial, transportation to industrial. First, I use residential and commercial the most. At home I have gas heating, stove and fireplace; gas pretty

Human activity has impacted natural vegetation in Texas. According to sources, the region south of San Antonio was originally brush country, with mesquite, small live and post oak, prickly pear cactus, bluestem, buffalo grass, and bunchgrass. Much of this native vegetation has been replaced with agricultural crops. Among the more

The lands and seas of Central Asia, East Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia and Australia/Oceania are no longer what they used to be. Animals are becoming endangered, the Great Barrier reef is dying, and the land has become eroded due to human impact. The main causes of loss in biodiversity include invasive species, deforestation, land and water use change, over hunting, pollution, and climate change.

What is this link about? The link is to a report, titled Ecosystems and Human Well-Being, A Report of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. The report covers ecosystem changes and how that is intertwined with humans and their well-being. The ecosystems of the earth are complex and have many variables. Human actions can have a significant impact on these ecosystems and the report aims to seeks and apply scientific analysis and reasoning to how human actions have and need to change to support these diverse ecosystems focusing on sustainability.

Species are disappearing at a rate of 100 times higher than if humans weren´t around. They get used to their environment, but we destroy them by cutting trees to make paper or built buildings, we liberate so much CO2 during fossil fuel burning, which affects the climate in which they

Pollution is killing and harming wildlife in the united states and all around the world. Oil spills are very bad and have huge affects on wildlife, toxic metals like lead kill many animals each year, pesticides are thought to be good for crops but have bad affects on wildlife. All

Scuba divers can damage reefs, uncontrolled fishing can cause a rapid decline in fish populations. clearing forests will reduce living space and increase competition between species, damming rivers can disrupt normal patterns and deprive species of water or a place to live, trash and pollution can put harmful chemicals into

In an ever-expanding world where resource scarcity is discussed in side conversations and overpopulation is being combatted by concerned nations, worldwide struggle of equal allocation of vital resources persist. Biological resources and biodiversity in general are at the forefront of these concerns. Decreasing biodiversity does not just pose a problem for the plants and animals that are becoming increasingly endangered; individuals who have constructed their livelihood around the availability of such resources face dire circumstances as scarcity arises. The greater the variety of abundant plant and animal species present in the world, the greater the potential opportunity, opportunities such as medical discoveries and newfound scientific knowledge that increase the sustainability of life on Earth. However, tragedy of the commons, has led to overuse of biological resources across the globe, throwing the issue of sustainability into question. While species extinction is a natural process in the world ecosystem, the rate at which it has increased is not. In the past 65 million years the rate of extinction has gone from one to five species per year to roughly 1,000 to 10,000 times that rate (Diversity, 2013, pg. 1). This is no longer a matter of natural selection; this is a matter of ineffective resource regulation worldwide. Despite extensive amounts of environmental legislation actively in place, specie scarcity will continue to grow. The greatest challenge now

In an ever-expanding world where resource scarcity is discussed in side conversations and overpopulation is being combatted by concerned nations, worldwide struggle of equal allocation of vital resources persist. Biological resources and biodiversity in general are at the forefront of these concerns. Decreasing biodiversity does not just pose a problem for the plants and animals that are becoming increasingly endangered; individuals who have constructed their livelihood around the availability of such resources face dire circumstances as scarcity arises. The greater the variety of abundant plant and animal species present in the world, the greater the potential opportunity, opportunities such as medical discoveries and newfound scientific knowledge that increase the sustainability of life on Earth. However, tragedy of the commons, has led to overuse of biological resources across the globe, throwing the issue of sustainability into question. While species extinction is a natural process in the world ecosystem, the rate at which it has increased is not. In the past 65 million years the rate of extinction has gone from one to five species per year to roughly 1,000 to 10,000 times that rate (Diversity, 2013, pg. 1). This is no longer a matter of natural selection; this is a matter of ineffective resource regulation worldwide.

Policy- and decision-makers claim information about the causes of population declines which driving species on the brink of extinction (). However, it is pointed out that the causes of vulnerability remain unclear to explain the variation to the risk of extinction (). According to Reynolds (2003), vulnerability is determinate by both the decline of species population and the reduction of their geographical range. These two forms of vulnerability are affected by both species’ mortality and habitat loss, which are the causes of intrinsic biological traits, extrinsic human induced effects and stochastic factors that likely determine the population trends (). It is suggested that extinction risk is not distributed by chance between taxa,

Everyday humans spit gum on sidewalks, use gas to commute to work, throw trash on the ground, never managing to clean up after themselves. Pollution, intentional or not, affects animals all around the world. Over the last 40 years, wildlife populations have fallen by 58% (“World Wildlife 'Falls by 58%

According to http://wwf.panda.org/ Pollutants like oil, nitrogen, detergents, and phosphate can have a significant impact on an ecosystem. It can create chaos on an ecological balance by encouraging plant growth and killing fish. Fish would die because of the lack of oxygen due to the oxygen cycle stopping. 1 million water aquatic species are put at risk because of water pollution. This makes it hard for amphibians to reproduce because water pollution is killing off species before they can. Water pollution also affects coral reef reproduction. When pollutants enter the water they smother reefs. This can damage the algae in the reef and affect the speed and growth of the reef. When the algae is lost the coral starts to die. Once the coral starts

C. IMPACT OF PRESENT GLOBAL LOSS OF BIODIVERSITY ON THE FUTURE Loss of Biodiversity will affect the life cycle of several species which depend on each other for survival. This dependence determines the survival of species and the change of our environment. Exploiting the biodiverse species to extinction will result in desertification, rise in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, increased pollution, increased droughts, increase in loss of items that we derive from nature for our own survival such as honey, fruits, vegetables, medicines etc. The greed to exploit will result in our ultimate extinction If a sustainable solution isn’t provided to prevent loss of biodiversity. If we continue the path we are on without taking steps to balance the equation the planet will

Introduction Many factors contribute to the downfall of the ecosystem. As studies show there has been many changes made to the ecosystem of the years. While looking at the great scheme of things, the changes have been negative and steadily declining with time. Among those factors, over-population would be one of the greatest contributors. The growth of the human population has continuously been on the rise. It has been predicted that it will increase even more throughout the years going from 7.2 billion to 9.6 billion (Gerland, et al. 2014). As the numbers of the human population increase the ecosystem is steadily declining because of the large demands of food and biofuels (Laurance, et al. 2014). Agriculture is best known as a

Irrational and overuse Pollution being the most effective terminator for our environment, which effectively does its homework in four different modes viz. Air, water, soil/land and sound. Air pollution which is pretty prominent & has various incarnations. It’s arsenal include oxides of carbon, nitrogen, sulphur, particulates , Volatile organic compound, particulates etc. The emissions from the chimneys, exhausts & vehicles all contribute in tainting the air, the ballistic use of the aerosol cans, refrigerators, air conditioners has flooded the atmosphere with the CFSs which phagocytize the ozone layer, thereby making organisms more prone to the harmful UV radiations from the sun. The perpetuations of the release of oxides of Carbon especially Carbon dioxide has resulted in green house effect which has caused Global warming thereby increasing the average temperature of the earth. These can have severe repercussions of that of posing a threat to submerge small islands, drastically increasing the fraction of water; it could also strangle the living conditions for the polar bears, penguins and other Antarctic region animals. While the oxides of sulfur and nitrogen help in reducing the pH of water vapor in the atmosphere making it acidic resulting in acid rain. Smoke emitted combines with fog to form the venomous smog. All these are nocuous to the mankind. They