How large or big is the biological diversity of the earth?
After 20 years of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and 11th Conference of Parties (CoP) and billions of dollars expenditure, even experts do not know the exact size of the earth’s biodiversity, that is, how many plant and animal species thrive on the earth.
There are conflicting reports of the exact number of plant and animal species in the world. The UN Convention on Biological Diversity, which comprises about 200 nations, is also not sure of the scientific extent of biodiversity.
Biodiversity is the existence of varied forms of life — plant and animal. Knowing the exact extent of biodiversity will help in its proper conservation. The CBD has now embarked upon the mega mission of documenting the global flora and it will take another eight years to compile it. That still leaves the documentation of the fauna.
Special secretary in the Union ministry of environment and forests, admitted M.F. Farooqui, at a press conference here on Monday that the extent of biodiversity is scientifically not known.
Newer species are discovered while many existing species are pushed to the verge of extinction. Every year hundreds of new species, particularly of arthropods, are discovered. This makes the task of species documentation quite challenging. In a recent exercise, as many as six lakh plant species have been deleted from dictionary of life as they are “duplicates” of known species. This has brought down the strength of plant kingdom from 10 lakh species to just four lakh.