Global ‘red list’ of endangered species growing fast
A Canada lynx, listed as endangered by the U.S. Government, lies wounded on a road in Colorado after being hit by a car.
The latest biodiversity assessment by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature shows that about 36 percent of species on the global “red list” are threatened by extinction.
Altogether, the IUCN has listed 47,677 species of concern. About 17,300 of them are on the road to extinction.
“IUCN’s Red List is the best set of data available to gauge the status of ecosystem conservation through species,” said Claude Gascon, executive vice president of field programs at Conservation International. “The numbers released today are profoundly worrying, as they show that we are racing along an unsustainable development path that threatens the natural systems that sustain all life on the planet.”
According to Conservation International, protecting ecosystems that support biodiversity is one of the most effective means to fight climate change, and is a key source of income for people across the globe.
As the world focuses on the fight against climate change, IUCN’s assessment underlines the need for governments meeting in Copenhagen to look at the conservation of biodiversity and the ecosystems that sustain it, especially tropical forests, as one of the most effective and quickest means of climate stabilization.
“Any climate agreement coming out of Copenhagen must include a set of policy reforms and financial incentives to compensate efforts to keep forests standing as deforestation is responsible for about 20 percent of the world’s annual carbon emissions as well as massive biodiversity loss.” said Gascon.
Click here for more information on the IUCN Red List.
Click here for the Conservation International home page.
A group of passers-by helps load a wounded lynx into a cage after it was hit by a car on Highway 9, between Frisco and Breckenridge, in Summit County, Colorado. The lynx was brought to a veterinary clinic but died as it was being examined by a veterinarian. Lynx were extirpated from Colorado by humans. The Colorado Division of Wildlife has launched an ambitious reintroduction program, but many of the cats have been killed by cars or poachers.
