This will be a hard pill for nature lovers to swallow, but a recent report from the United Nations revealed that the Earth has lost 68 percent of species since 1970. This a huge problem for both wildlife and humans. Without a diverse range of animals and the lands they inhabit, humanity is poised to lose the ecosystems that regulate our climate, provide natural resources, and gives us a buffer to prevent pandemics.
That brings us to an extremely important question: How can we halt biodiversity collapse? According to a team of scientists from the research organization RESOLVE, the most effective, cheapest solution is returning half of the planet to nature.
More specifically, the researchers say we must protect 50.4 percent of the Earth’s land, which is a massive increase from 15.1 percent of the land area currently protected. While this might seem difficult to pull off, the researchers at RESOLVE have teamed up with a number of organizations to create a report that identifies the exact land areas that need to be protected to prevent climate collapse and estimated the potential carbon storage for each region.
The report, which is being called the “Global Safety Net,” goes a step further than other reports calling for the conservation and rewinding of half the world by providing a real blueprint that lawmakers can follow in order to save the planet from biodiversity loss. They’ve even created a Global Safety Net app that features an interactive map of those areas, made in partnership with Google Earth Engine.
Recently, RESOLVE’s founder Eric Dinerstein spoke with the green-minded publication Grist to speak at length about how saving our land means saving the world. You can find the interview right here.
