Celebrate the World Biodiversity Day!

May 17th, 2008 | Celebrations, Environment, Nature and Science

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Biodiversity is the total number of species or life forms within any given ecosystem. The more varied the species, the healthier the earth is. Even cockroaches have their uses.

To celebrate a healthy Earth, the UN established International Day for Bilogical Biodiversity, which is celebrated every May 22, intending to bring biodiversity issues into focus. This is relevant to our times since global warming and climate change are likely to become the dominant and direct cause of biodiversity loss (wikipedia.org).

The theme for 2008 is “Biodiversity and Agriculture.” It seeks to “highlight the importance of sustainable agriculture not only to preserve biodiversity, but also to ensure that we will be able to feed the world, maintain agricultural livelihoods, and enhance human well being into the 21st century and beyond.”

Click here for a list of countries who have already scheduled and submitted activities. At the moment, they include Azerbaijan, Canada, Colombia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, the EU, Italy, Japan, Sri Lanka, and the UK. If your country is not on the list but celebrates biodiversity day in its own way, try to get the right officials to submit their participation to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) Secretariat.

Canada, home to the CBD Secretariat, is inviting individuals and organizations to organize an event and submit a summary here. They also graciously provided a guide so we don’t have to wrack our brains for appropriate activities, click here for the list.

What can we do? Let’s help get the word out and promote awareness.

Need any help in introducing the concept of biodiversity to your kids? Try this books at Amazon:

1. Tree of Life: The Incredible Biodiversity of Life on Earth (Aspca Henry Bergh Children’s Book Awards)

Winner of the Aspca Henry Bergh Children’s Book Awards. The book offers an excellent introduction to biodiversity and how everything is related to one another in a great Tree of Life.

2. Life on Earth: The Story of Evolution

An introduction to evolution and Earth’s biodiversity for ages 4 to 8. Atractive cover, typography, and illustrations.

3. Children of the Sea: Marine Diversity of Caribbean

Highlights of 2 teachers’ and their youthful students’ expeditions in the Bahamas and Caribbean. Hardcover and illustated with pictures.

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11 comments ↓

#1 Bushie (Who am I?) on 05.18.08 at 10:31 am

I would have to say that biodiversity in agriculture is a subject close to my heart. Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to be compatable with the current agriculture practise of monocultures (growing only one thing). I prefer to see farms with strips of bushland, I’m sure it’s better for the soil and seeing flocks of cockatoos or a lone bird of prey surely does life the spirits.

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#2 allnewrelease.com (Who am I?) on 05.18.08 at 10:37 pm

nice article, very interesting explaining about biodiversity… thanks

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#3 TN (Who am I?) on 05.19.08 at 10:07 pm

Hello there…

@ Bushie

I know what you mean. It’s not only in Australia where cash crops have taken over wide swaths of land. Monoculture is a practice that is harmful to the environment, the soil, and, inevitably, to our pockets.

Maybe that’s why the biodiversity scientists have finally focused attention to Agriculture.

Thanks for dropping by and to you too, all new release.

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#4 Gerhard (Who am I?) on 05.20.08 at 10:03 pm

I read this article and have to say that its great!

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#5 TN (Who am I?) on 05.21.08 at 9:24 pm

@ Gerhard

Thanks.

====================================
There was another comment here by colleen with the following URL that I accidentally deleted…

http://dorkage.net/

In effect, she was saying that biodiversity goes head to head with making money and that biodiversity will win in the end and we may not be a part of it.

My reply to the comment was…

She’s right. People talk of destroying nature when the opposite is true. Unless we blow it up, the Earth will still be here long after we were gone as a species.

Making money can coexist with nature and biodiversity if we aren’t too greedy.

Take farmlands for example. We plant corn year in and year out hoping to get the most produce in as little area and time as possible, replenishing depleted nutrients with chemical fertilizers and killing the soil in the process.

If we, instead, practice crop rotation (where we rotate nutrient hungry crops with nitrogen-fixing legumes) and organic farming, we can produce food more sustainably. Since we are planting more plant species in a single plot, it is , in essence, biodiversity in agriculture.

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#6 Kim Cash (Who am I?) on 05.22.08 at 12:29 am