Almost half of all plant species are facing extinction. Earlier, the World Conservation Union thought only one in eight plant species would disappear, but now it looks like we’ll lose half of them, and some researchers think we?ll lose even more. Most of the medicines used in the West were discovered in tropical forests, which are being cut down fast, and the potential to develop new drugs may vanish along with them.
More plants disappear every year and even the landscapes in Western countries are developing a noticeable sameness, as landscaped suburbs replace natural habitats. We have reliable data on plants in Europe, North America, South Africa and Australia, but there are no figures for tropical or developing countries, where most of the world’s plants grow. However, we know that, due to overcutting of forests and land being cleared for farming, these areas are losing plants at a rapid rate and most of them don?t grow anywhere else.
Researchers Nigel Pitman and Peter Jorgensen says, “Only with the species-by-species information?will conservationists be able to monitor and prevent the large-scale plant extinctions foreseen to occur in the tropics in this century.”
It?s getting so we see the same franchise stores and restaurants wherever we travel in the U.S. and even the world. Are we going to start seeing the same few plant species everywhere as well?
Want to live in a different?and better?way? Jose Arguilles says you should base your days on the Mayan calendar. He does, and says it?s changed his life. He explains how in ?Time & Technosphere,?click here.
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