A
two- year study by accounting firm PriceWaterhouseCoopers, commissioned
by the UN Environment Program, (UNEP) titled “The Economics of
Ecosystems and Biodiversity” (TEEB) puts a price tag on the economic
impact of environmentally-damaging business practices that cripple or
prevent flora and fauna from providing ecosystem services.
The
report brings attention to the largely ignored multibillion dollar
deficits resulting from activities that cause water contamination,
deforestation, fish depletion and land loss due to soil erosion and
drought.
The estimated annual cost to the world economy in 2008 for
such practices was between US$2 trillion and US$4.5 trillion, equating
to as much as 7.5% of global income.
These findings are
particularly critical today as human-caused global warming continues to
trigger the rapid deterioration of global biodiversity. Dr. Heather
MacKay of the international wetlands conservation agreement, the Ramsar
Convention, spoke to Supreme Master Television of the gravity of the
situation.
Dr. Heather MacKay, Chair of Ramsar Convention’s
Scientific and Review Panel (STRP) (F): It’s really gotten to the point
where it’s very serious. We are seeing now many very significant tipping
points being reached in ecosystems. So we’re very worried and need to
try and reverse this.
VOICE: The United Nations Food and
Agriculture Organization (FAO) has named animal raising for meat and
dairy production among the primary factors of biodiversity loss.
As
an earlier FAO report stated, “Indeed, the livestock sector may well be
the leading player in the reduction of biodiversity, since it is the
major driver of deforestation, as well as one of the leading drivers of
land degradation, pollution, climate change, overfishing, sedimentation
of coastal areas and facilitation of invasions by alien species.”
Dr. Heather MacKay (F): It’s
true that intensive production of livestock can take up significant
resources. We will all have to look at our diets, what we eat, what we
consume, where we get our water.
All of those things will become
important. We need to work on an international level on governance,
national level with policies and laws, but we will also need to actively
restore large ecosystems, to restore biodiversity, to protect it.
VOICE:
Thank you, Dr. MacKay, PriceWaterhouseCoopers and UNEP, for
highlighting yet another aspect of the immense benefit provided by the
plants and animals in our environment.
May we all quickly adopt a
biodiversity-conserving plant-based diet for the sake of the global
economy as well as all life on Earth. Supreme Master Ching Hai has long
emphasized the vital need for conservation and protection of all fellow
beings, as during a July 2008 videoconference in Formosa (Taiwan).
Supreme Master Ching Hai:
So we lost many of these precious species, we lost many of us, because
they are us. And we still did not wake up yet. We should have more
rules, more guidelines, to protect natural habitats.
Above all,
enlightenment is really what’s needed to govern. That’s number one. And
vegan diet with right motive, number two, will offer more compassion
and insight, also will help preserve precious natural habitats for the
wild and protect the resources for humans.
http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2266348/un-warns-biodiversity-loss http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10587022http://gbo3.cbd.int/media/2721/gbo_en_web.pdf
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