Showing posts with label ecosystem services. Show all posts

Getting rid of lawns - Planting Meadows


There are many ways in which we as individuals can impact biodiversity and ecosystem health. One simple positive change would be for households to change their monoculture grass lawns into biodiverse meadows. 

In Sweden, 52% of the urban green areas are lawns and in the United States lawns cover about 2% of the land area. Lawns may cover as much as 1.4% of the global grassland area and lawn grass is the largest irrigated nonfood crop. This is a extremely wasteful use of resources simply to maintain lawnscapes that does not promote biodiversity or food production.



Gardens could have many positive impacts, for example: providing habitats, storing carbon, air purification, nutrient cycling, water filtration, that are ruined by destructive management practices such as power lawn-mower, irrigation, pesticide use and chemical fertilizers. Lawns usually have very little biodiversity because they are monocultures. 

Lots of studies show that allowing gardens to become more wild, i.e. more diverse like natural ecosystem, by for example planting meadows or food forests would help promote biodiversity while providing us with vital ecosystem services such as fruits, healthy soils, pollination, cleaner air etc. Biodiverse healthy garden ecosystems also provide tremendous aesthetic and cultural values that are achievable without lots of money. Not only that it gives us joy and mental reprieve in a time of enormous social stress.

In many industrial societies, gardens have an enormous potential to provide habitat for many species on the verge of extinction due to the loss of traditional landscapes. Meadows and food forests require very little intervention, are beautiful and provide habitat for a number of threatened species. In a temperate climate like Sweden, meadows that bloom from spring to autumn are a suitable replacement for lawns and would provide relief for many species that once were common in the days of open pastures and small scale non-mechanical farming.

There is now a practical handbook in how to cultivate a meadow in your own garden from the Swedish University of Agriculture that can be found here.
 
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Rapid loss of life on Earth

Turtle caught in plastic pollution in the Ocean.

Humanity's population explosion and massive overconsumption of natural resources is killing off wildlife at an unprecedented rate. In the 2018 Living Planet Report by the World Wildlife Foundation (WWF) we come to understand that there has been a 60% decline in species population sizes since 1970. Especially hard hit are the tropics in South and Central America, which have seen a 89% loss compared to 1970. And freshwater ecosystems, like rivers and lakes, have experienced the largest decline of 83%. We have killed off 83% of all mammals and 50% of all plants since the dawn of civilisation, and its irreversible on human timescales. It is truly a biological annihilation as coined in a scientific study published by Ceballos et al. in PNAS last year.



In 2017 the world lost an amount of forest area equivalent to the size of Italy, destroying habitats, causing biodiversity loss and polluting the environment. There is a growing number of scientists that are now calling for a global deal for nature, creating vast nature reserves to prevent biological armageddon.



The loss of biodiversity is a tragedy in itself but it also threatens the survival of civilisation says experts to the Guardian. People don't understand that biodiversity underpins ecosystem health and thus human health. We already see a dramatic rise in chronic diseases caused by unhealthy diets and pollution. Around 93% of the world's children under the age of 15 years, 1.8 billion children, breathe air so polluted it puts their health at risk and tragically about 600,000 children die from acute lower respiratory infections every year. Studies have also shown that it's not just seabirds that have plastic in their stomachs but we humans have it too. 

Can we turn this development around? We only have until the year 2020 to get our act together according to the WWF-report or it will be too late. Governments need to increase investments several fold into safeguarding biodiversity on land and in the oceans. Protected areas should be expanded to cover at least 20 percent of natural habitats on land and 30 percent of habitats in the ocean. But I'm having a hard time seeing that happening in a world of depleting resources and growing population. Do we have foresight enough to safeguard life on Earth for our own survival? It remains an open question I guess...
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Democracy enough to handle ecological crisis?

Pagoda Japan. Source: WaSZI CCO Creative Commons

How to handle a crisis of overexploitation


Throughout history, agricultural societies have had to struggle with the balance between population growth and maintaining sufficient resources to support themselves. Some failed to manage their resource base sustainably which lead to collapse or disbanding while others took measures to ensure more sustainable use of their lands and persisted. 

In modern times we all assume that democracy is a better option than authoritarian forms of government. Of course no one likes the idea of abuse of power and state violence that usually comes along with such forms of government. But are democracies inherently superior to authoritarian regimes in dealing with crises such as resource depletion? 

To adapt to/or manage scarcity governments may have to do some unpopular things like restricting consumption, manage usage rights of natural resources and punish offenders. Can leaders find support for such policies through elections? Its very much an open question. Small communities have been known to manage pasture lands in a democratic manner more sustainably. But today's societies are huge in comparison. 

Let's look at a historical case in which the Japanese, that had relatively large cities in terms of number even back during feudal times, managed to establish more sustainable forest management through both top-down and bottom-up practices.


Forest Management in Feudal Japan

Ecological crisis


Japan had a serious deforestation problem 300 years ago as a consequence of a growing population and unsustainable forest use. Forests were overexploited by logging mainly for timber and fuelwood. By 1570 Japan's population had reached 10 million people and needs for forest products had increased correspondingly. With the advent of the Tokugawa shogunate and peace, followed by rapid growth of cities and construction of castles, temples and shrines, logging increased during the 1600s to a scale never before experienced in Japan. Conflict between villagers and rulers over the use of forest lands became intense. By 1670 the population had increased to nearly 30 million and all the old growth forest had been completely logged, except for in Hokkaido. The supply of timber and other forest products was running out. Soil erosion, floods, landslides and barren lands were becoming common. Japan was headed for ecological disaster. 


Feudal lords take action


There were three principal types of forest land tenure during the Tokugawa period (1603-1867). Feudal lords tenure, communal tenure and individual tenure. Individual tenure failed to develop because individual land ownership was prohibited in principle by the Tokugawa Shogunate. Therefore, almost all Japanese forest land tenure was either the feudal lords tenure or communal. 

Access to the forest owned by feudal lords was strictly limited and those who logged illegally were severely punished. A typical example of forest owned and managed by a feudal lord was the Kiso area that was owned and managed by a relative of the Shogun.

The two major cities Edo and Osaka and forest management places like Kiso. Source: Iwamoto (2002)



Before the Tokugawa period, Kiso was covered with thick forest but by the late 17th century iso forest resource had deteriorated greatly. The feudal lord therefore carried out the first reform in 1665, instituting seedling protection, strengthening of patrols and selective cutting. The reform reduced timber production by half and cut the feudal lords income severely. Only a few years later the lord ordered an increase in timber production for financial reasons. Even though the reform first failed the second reform was planned in 1724. In this reform, timber production was reduced by more than 60% and this time it succeeded, carrying on for 30 years and thus allowing the forest to recover. 


Common lands


During the Tokugawa period most Japanese people made their living by agriculture, managing uncultivated mountainous common lands surrounding their villages. Common forest lands provided a wide variety of ecosystem services such as timber, fuelwood, fertilizer, feed, clean water, erosion control etc. In the late 17th century, intensive forestry with artificial planting was begun by members (farmers) of the commons in response to increasing demand for wood. People planted valuable conifers such as sugi and hinoki and developing new techniques for planting, thinning and pruning plantations necessary for high-quality timber. Wandering scholars wrote silviculture manuals and traveled around the country spreading the new technology from village to village. Forest management stimulated new social institutions for the ruling elite and villagers to cooperate on timber production in a way that provided villagers incentives to produce timber: yamawari (dividing use rights of common lands among families), nenkiyama (long term leases of forest lands to villagers by the rulers), and buwakibayashi (villagers producing timber on rulers land and sharing the harvest with the elites). Slowly but surely reforesting took place. 

Lessons from history


First of, action on the part of the ruling elite and villagers did not happen until forest resources were severely degraded and conflict arose between the two. New management practices were forced upon the population and breaking the rules meant severe punishment. Reforms sometimes failed due to financial interests and needs. Relying heavily on one sector for the majority of income was a bad strategy. A more diversified income probably helped later reforms to succeed. New forest management practices lead to the development of new social institutions that were more cooperative and respectful of usage rights. During hard times forests may have been overexploited but reforestation efforts during easier times helped prevent the worst of outcomes. The feudal lords were probably not very lenient towards villagers and ordinary people must have, at first, disliked the decision to cut back on timber production and being punished for logging in certain areas. However, they adapted to this new reality and started planting trees to meet the demand. Its a case of non-democratic rule that actually had a positive outcome in terms of more sustainable use of Japan's forests. Now, it should be mentioned that forests were again overexploitation during the second world war. And perhaps the previous reforms only succeeded due to times of peace. It also should be mentioned that after the war forests, both from common and lords lands, where taken up into public lands managed by the state. But it's still an interesting example to ponder. Perhaps a mix of both top-down and bottom-up rules is needed but to achieve successful management but its hard to imagine it happening without some amount of unpopular decision-making if the society is large.
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Pestilence - Deadlier than war

"Everybody knows that pestilences have a way of recurring in the world; yet somehow we find it hard to believe in ones that crash down on our heads from a blue sky" ‒ Albert Camus, The Plague, 1948

The only top predator left to infect

When humans start putting extreme pressure on local ecosystems, through for example overpopulation and deforestation, communities become more susceptible to emerging or novel zoonotic diseases as natural habitats disappear and exposure to pathogens increases. Several of today’s most pervasive diseases originally stemmed from domestication of livestock some 10,000 years ago. For example, tuberculosis, measles, and smallpox emerged following the domestication of wild cattle. Many pathogens that are currently passed from person to person, including influenza, Ebola and HIV, were formerly zoonotic but have mutated and adapted to human hosts. Today, wild animals are significantly more likely to be a source for animal-to-human spillover of viruses than domesticated species. According to one recent study, wild rodents are the most common source (58%) of spillover of zoonotic viruses, followed by primates and bats. Wildlife habitat destruction or encroachment, changes in surface waters, industrial monocultures, chemical pollution, uncontrolled urbanization, migration, international travel and trade have all increased the risk of disease spread in humans and the potential for a pandemic.

Toxic Cocktail

We know that our highly interconnected global society is very vulnerable to disruptions in food, water and energy supply. Another threat to the continuation of our civilization is global toxification. The 30 million tonnes a year global output in synthetic chemicals has left no living creature on Earth without these chemicals in its organs. The full impact of the chemical soup we are all living in whether we are a whale or a human are yet unknown. However, we know that the emergence of widespread antibiotic resistance is likely to cross paths with our exhausted immune systems compromised by chemical contamination, and the fact that with such high population density in many urban areas we are increasingly vulnerable to pandemics.

Exposure of fish and wildlife in urban regions due to continuous release of Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals in oceans and to the atmosphere.Source: WHO, 2012

Antibiotic Resistance

The fact that some antibiotics no longer work in people who need them to treat infections is now a major threat to public health, according to WHO. Over the last 30 years, no major new types of antibiotics have been developed.
According to a recent study published in the journal Lancet Infectious Diseases, scientists in China have discovered significantly increased levels of bacteria resistant to the antibiotic colistin in pigs. The drug is a last line of defense against a host of bacterial infections, many of which are common in people. Researchers have linked the growing prevalence of “super-germs” to the overuse of antibiotics in food animals. The drugs, used predominantly in the Chinese livestock industry, can keep animals healthy in an industrialized food process, but their use over time can embolden the very bacteria they were designed to fight against. In 2005, the European Union banned the use of antibiotics in livestock for non-medicinal purposes, but the drugs are still widely used across the continent, and are rampant in the agricultural industry in the United States. As people in wealthier regions run out of effective antibiotics, they come to share the lot of people in poorer regions who can’t afford them to begin with. In April 2014, the WHO declared that the problem “threatens the achievements of modern medicine. A post-antibiotic era — in which common infections and minor injuries can kill — is a very real possibility for the 21st century.”

Historical Pandemics


The Plague
The bacterium Yersinia pestis carried by fleas on rodents has caused at least three human plague pandemics, the Justinian Plague (6–8th centuries), the Black Death (14–17th centuries) and third Plague (19–20th centuries). In 541 A.D., the Justinian Plague caused 5,000 deaths per day in Constantinople, killing an estimated 25 million people globally. It spread from central Asia or Africa across the Mediterranean into Europe and may have contributed to the end of the Roman empire, marking the transition from the classical to the Medieval period. The Black Death arrived in the Eastern Mediterranean in 1347 and struck Italy, southern France with vehemence in 1348, came to England at the end of that year and spread northwards reaching Scandinavia in 1350. 

Larger cities were the worst off, as population densities and close living quarters made disease transmission easier. Cities were filthy with poor sanitation, infested with lice, fleas, and rats, and subject to diseases related to malnutrition and poor hygiene. Where the plague raged, it raged for a couple of months and then spent itself. The Black Death killed an estimated 100 million people over 7 years. Religious fanaticism in the wake of the Black Death lead to the persecution of groups such as Jews, friars, foreigners, beggars, lepers and Romani, as Europeans thought that they were to blame for the crisis. Subsequent outbreaks of this disease occurred in 8–12 year cycles for two centuries after the initial epidemic, with estimated mortality of 15–40%. The emergence of these plague pandemics might be tightly linked to climatic instability as all were preceded by periods of exceptional rainfall and ended during periods of climatic stability.
Hypothetical scenario for the geographic spread of Yersinia pestis. Source: Wagner et al. (2014)

The Spanish Flu
In 1918-19, the Spanish flu (H1N1) killed roughly 100 million people and infected 500 million people while affecting working age people (15–54 year olds) most severely. WWI was raging at the time and governments tried to control the public by limiting free speech. The pandemic was known as Spanish flu because Spain was not at war, had a more free press, and could report on the illness. Most of Europe had a censored press. In the U.S. the Sedition Act 1918 was passed, extending the Espionage Act of 1917 to cover a broader range of offenses, notably speech and the expression of opinion that cast the government or the war effort in a negative light. The 1918–1919 influenza pandemic swept across countries during a time when patriotism was more important than truth. Thus, intimidation and propaganda were part of the communication culture. People heard from authorities and newspapers that everything was going fine, but at the same time, bodies were piling up.
Emergency hospital during 1918 influenza pandemic, Camp Funston, Kansas.
Source: Otis Historical Archives Nat'l Museum of Health & Medicine (CC-BY 2.0)

War and disease

According to the WHO, previous to the conflict in Syria, more than 90% of Syrian children were vaccinated against disease like measles and polio. Since the fighting in Syria began almost 5 years ago, half of all health workers have left the country, medical supplies are scarce and most facilities are in decay. Some 20 million people have fled their homes in the MENA region. Countries like Jordan and Lebanon are under immense pressure as demand on services for health, water and sanitation have increased exponentially. The low immunization rates among those living in and fleeing from conflict zones, endangers the lives of people across the entire region. The recent outbreak of polio in Syria led to its resurgence in Iraq, which had been free of the disease for 14 years, and in 2013, Jordan experienced a new outbreak of measles. In Yemen there has been an upsurge in cases of measles and dengue fever due to lack of basic health care and collapsed water and sanitation facilities. WHO estimates show that 2.6 million children under 15 years of age in Yemen are at risk of measles; 2.5 million under 5 are at risk of diarrhoeal disease and another 1.3 at risk of acute respiratory infections.

Second order effects

Limiting the disruption of critical infrastructures during a pandemic is important for the survival and health of society (i.e., electricity, water, and food) as most medical and public health responses to a pandemic depend on these infrastructures. The food system’s dependence on the transportation system creates a major vulnerability. On average, food travels 2092 km (1,300 miles) from farm to fork. The global food system functions in a just-in-time economy where food inventories are intentionally kept at such low levels that food arrives just in time for consumption. Since inventories are kept very low, there is vulnerability to unanticipated variations in flow. Increasing stocks of food costs money and decreases profits, therefore, agricultural businesses are reluctant to build food security resilience via stockpiling. The Ebola epidemic that began in 2014 has caused severe food shortages in West Africa. As of November 2014, the World Food Program estimated that 460,000 additional individuals became food insecure in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea as a result of production and trade reductions. According to a recent study, a severe pandemic with <25% reduction in labor availability could create widespread food shortages in the US. This likely applies to other countries as well, especially those with insufficient resources and food production at home. 
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Abrupt changes in ecosystems

Credit: Lamiot (CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Ecological regime shifts

Human pressure on the planet's ecosystems have in some cases lead to gradual changes but more often it has lead to surprising, large and persistent ecological regime shifts. Such shifts challenges environmental stewardship because it leads to substantial changes in ecosystem services at the same time as these shifts are hard to predict and reverse.

A new study in PLOS now indicates that the most common drivers to ecological regime shifts include: climate change, agriculture and fishing. Aquatic systems, such as kelp forests, have been most affected by regime shifts. The good news, however, is that 62% of identified drivers can be managed at local or national scales, while only 38% can only be managed internationally.

Source: Rocha et al. (2015)

Food production and energy consumption major drivers 


According to the study, food production and climate change are key drivers of regime shifts that are coupled with one another and have the potential to lead to large-scale cascading effects. Food production relates to a number of negative drivers such as resource depletion, pollution, habitat destruction, and deforestation which have the potential to be managed locally or regionally. While climate change drivers needs to be managed internationally. 

Most drivers of ecological change are increasing along with the exponential growth of the world's economy. So while reducing local drivers of ecosystem change can build resilience to continued global change over the short term, global changes will eventually overwhelm local management. Indicating that it is necessary but insufficient to act only on a local to regional scale.
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Entering Earth's 6th Great Mass Extinction

The 6th Great Mass-Extinction

For a decade now it has been widely debated whether humanity has set in motion a sixth great mass extinction event, comparable to the catastrophe which erased the dinosaurs some 66 million years ago. According to a recent study by Ehrlich et al. (2015) there is no longer any doubt, we truly have.

There is general agreement among biologists that extinction rates have reached levels unparallelled since previous mass extinctions on Earth. However, some have believed the numbers to be overestimated. But this new study confirms that species are disappearing up to about 100 times faster than the normal rate between mass extinctions, known as the background rate. If allowed to continue, life would need millions of years to recover.

The study took a precautionary approach and only allowed for conservative estimates, which means that their calculation probably underestimate the severity of the extinction crisis.

As human population continues to grow and consumers become more affluent more and more natural habitats will be altered or destroyed. Already in 2005 scientists warned that about 60% of all ecosystem services had been degraded or destroyed (Millennium Ecosystem Assessmentt). The long list of impacts include: land clearing for farming, logging and settlement, invasive species, carbon emissions that drive climate change and ocean acidification and toxins that alter and poison ecosystems. 

While there is still much discussion about the causes of some mass extinctions, it is generally believed that they can occur when the biosphere is under long-term stress, for example from a warming climate generated by greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere. As ever more species face extinction we lose the vital ecosystem services they provide, such as: pollination, water purification, pest control, storm control, soil regeneration etc. For its continued existence mankind is reliant upon an untold number of species that maintains the function of those services. As these species disappear, that existence becomes increasingly fragile.

Stanford biologist Paul Ehrlich calls for fast action to conserve threatened species and habitat before the window of opportunity closes. Below is a video from Standford with Ehrlich describing the issue.
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Global Freshwater Scarcity

The Amazon River in Brazil. Source: NASA

The Bloodstream of the Biosphere

Human pressure on the Earth’s Biosphere is so large that geologists have announced that we live in a new era, the Anthropocene, in which humanity is the largest driving force of global change. The mounting stresses on the biosphere to support 7,3 billion (to become 9 billion) people may cause collapses and major shifts in ecosystems, from local to global scales. The ability to generate social and economic well-being is now threatened. Freshwater is at the centre of this change.

Freshwater

Freshwater is the bloodstream of the terrestrial Biosphere. Greenwater (used by plants) and blue water (rivers and groundwater) are linked across all scales. It is a resource that supports human health, industry and energy generation. Many water systems have undergone ‘regime shifts’ whereby disturbances forces the water ecosystem to flip to an alternative stable state. For example, the Baltic Sea has gone from a low nutrient clear state to a high nutrient murky state due to eutrophication and overfishing. Potential future regime shift, with global implications, include the dieback of the Amazonian rainforest, Arctic ice loss and the Atlantic deep-water formation.

Water for food

Food production is the world’s largest user of freshwater. In many countries such as Brazil and China diets are changing to include more meat and dairy product which increases food water requirements. Globally, as much as 40% of the grain produced is converted to animal feed. By 2050, currently available water for croplands will not be sufficient for producing enough food for humanity. Agricultural water management is key to lowering freshwater depletion rates and increasing farm productivity. Global consumptive use of blue water has been estimated at 2600 km3 per year. Several regions already suffer from the widespread impacts of the overuse of blue water. River basins with withdrawals exceeding more than 40-60% of available water resources experience severe water scarcity. The number of people living in areas which suffer from blue water scarcity is soaring. In 2005, about 35% of the global population where living in areas with chronic water shortage.

Population living under water scarcity. Source: Rockström et al. (2014)

Unsustainable water use

About half of the river water withdrawn for societal use has evaporated, literally consumed during use, and about 25% of the rivers on land are highly affected by overuse of blue water. River depletion is considerable in irrigated regions of the world and many economically important river basins are already surpassing their ecological limits. Blue water security is subject to a high level of vulnerability to change in both Asia and Africa. For example, the Indus and Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna basins upon which some 1.5 billion people depend are highly vulnerable to change. Zones of particular concern are north-western India, the north China plain, the Great Plains of the US and the Central Valley in California. At the national scale, 5 countries are withdrawing more groundwater than can be recharged in aquifers, these include: Saudi Arabia, Libya, Egypt, Pakistan and Iran. 

Climate Change and rainwater

Until recently, humans have been able to assume that precipitation was relatively stable and predictable. However, new insights now show that this assumption no longer holds. Climate change is a major driving force of a changing water landscape and its projected that a 2 °C increase in average global temperatures will result in an increase of 40% of people living in absolute water scarcity. Floods and droughts will become more prominent and rainfall patterns could change. There are large uncertainties about future rain, monsoon and snow patterns that influence river flows. Glacial melt has been widely observed in the mountain water towers of the world, including the Himalayas, the Andes, the Alps and the Kilimanjaro.
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Ecosystem collapse in eastern Ukraine

Heavy artillery fire has started over 3000 forest fires in eastern Ukraine. But the biggest threat comes from flooded mines, according to Kyiv Post.

Seversky Donets River, Ukraine and Russian border in the Donbass Region. Source: Google Earth
It is not only humans that suffer in the ruins of a war-torn eastern Ukraine, entire ecosystems are about to collapse. The massive artillery fire that started this summer have burned down forests and poisoned the air.

Over 3000 forest fires have devastated the Donbass region. Two large nature reserves and 33 parks have been destroyed. More than 17% of the area has burned down, according to the environmental organisation Environmental People Law (EPL).

“The state of environment in eastern Ukraine constantly deteriorates. Water and soil pollution, degradation of natural reserves, destruction of forests and steppe by fires, transformation of landscapes, mines flooding became everyday reality” - Alla Voytsikhovska, spokesperson EPL 

The air is full of harmful substances from burnt-out ammunition, with high levels of sulphur-, nitrogen- and carbon dioxide, that can cause irritation and burning in eyes and airways as well as weaken the body’s immune system. The consequences of the devastation will be more fatal to humans than to nature itself. 

But the largest environmental threat comes from flooded mines. Around 100 mines located within separatist territory have been abandoned due to the war and are now contaminating groundwater and rivers. This could poison the Siverskij Donets river which is the regions largest drinking water source and that flows out in the Don and Azovska sea. The TV-station ukelife.tv reports that there are rising levels of radioactive mining water in the proximity of the Yunkom mine where the Soviet Union did nuclear tests in 1979. In the mine Oleksandr-Zakhid there is a layer with over 50 tonnes chlorinated hydrocarbons which have mixed with other toxic substances and now that the pumping of water has stopped risks rising up to ground level, creating a poisonous cloud. 

In order to start restoration of pre-war state of environment the scale of economic damage has to be assessed. But a full assessment of environmental damage and restoration costs is only possible after military actions in eastern Ukraine terminates. 
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Plastic is not fantastic

Plastic is not fantastic...in nature

Plastic materials is any of a wide range of synthetic compounds that are malleable. Plastics often contain many chemical substances and are commonly derived from petrochemicals, but some are partially natural. It takes about 2 kg oil for every 1 kg plastic production, from a life-cycle perspective. The more advanced plastics requires more energy for production. Due to their relatively low cost, ease of manufacture, versatility and imperviousness to water plastics are used in an enormous and expanding range of products from food packaging to computers and cars. Motivated by the finiteness of oil and threat of climate change, bioplastics are being developed from cellulose and starch. Most plastics, however, are durable and degrade very slowly, some taking centuries. Plastic pollution pose as a major problem for the world's marine life and food web. 

Using the world’s oceans as a dump

Humans have little consideration for how much waste we continuously dump into the world's oceans and its effects on marine life. Plastic pollution is nowadays common throughout the marine environment. In a new study in PLOS, scientists from the US, France, Chile, Australia and New Zealand report for the first time an estimated number of 5 trillion pieces of plastic in total afloat at sea. With a collective weight of over 250 000 tonnes, it weighs more than the entire biomass of humans (Guardian, 2014). The volume of plastic pieces, largely derived from products such as food and drink packaging and clothing was calculated from data collected in 24 expeditions during 2007-2013 across five sub-tropical gyres.
Seal trapped in plastic pollution. Photo: Nels Israelson CC-BY-NC

Plastics and Marine Life

Large pieces of plastic can strangle animals such as seals, while smaller pieces are ingested by fish and then fed up the food chain, all the way to us humans. Chemicals contained within plastics and the pollutants they attract once they’re in the marine environment are toxic and can cause great harm to animals and humans. It’s hard to tell how much pollution is being ingested by marine life but plastics definitely contribute to increased toxins along the food web. While spread out around the globe, much of the plastic accumulates in five large ocean gyres, which are circular currents that churn up plastics in a set area. The gyres contribute to the problem because they shred the plastic before dispersing it. This micro-plastic continue to disperse and interact with entire ocean ecosystems (see figure 1 and 2).
Fig.1 Pieces of plastic debris by size, pieces per square km

Fig.2 Weight of plastic debris by size, grams per square km

Plastic: the last frontier of recycling

Researchers predict the volume of plastic pollution will increase due to rising production of throwaway plastic, with only 5% of the world’s plastic currently recycled. Policymakers need to understand the scale of the problem and take action accordingly. Some countries have taken measures to restrict plastic pollution. Germany has changed policy so that manufacturers are responsible for the waste they produce. By putting more responsibility on producers a larger shift towards recycling in possible. Recycling plastic can save energy and reduce carbon pollution but a major hindrance is how to sort plastics effectively since its made up out of so many different chemical compounds (polymers). 700 000 tonnes plastic is thrown away unsorted in the Nordic countries every year. Three new reports (2014) from the Nordic Council of Ministers describe methods for improving collection, sorting, and recycling of plastic waste in the Nordic countries. “Collection and recycling of plastic waste” presents the first steps towards improved nordic systems for collection and recycling. Every year 65 000 tonnes of plastic is burned at recycling stations.“Guideline for plastic sorting at recycling centres” looks at municipal recycling station practices for increasing collection of plastic materials of higher quality. Despite usable recycling techniques being available, less than 30% of plastic waste is recycled. “Plastic value chains - Case WEEE” identifies a substantial potential for increased recycling of plastics from electronic waste. This field is an excellent case where circular economy principles could be applied, the potential for improvements being large.
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Waterworld

No, this post is not about the movie from 1995 starring Kevin Costner in the role of a mutated mariner. Although there is much attention in mainstream media on global sea level rise it is probably not the most serious issue we face from climate change. Instead, it's the scarcity of freshwater that concern many scientists and farmers.

Water scarcity

We live on a water planet and life itself depend on water. Freshwater resources are fundamental for maintaining human health, agricultural production, economic activity as well as critical ecosystem functions. Currently, 780 million people, about 1 in 9, lack access to clean drinking water and 2.5 billion people don't have access to a toilet (water.org). As population and demand grows, new constraints on water resources are appearing, raising questions about limits to water availability and its potential consequences. 

Global groundwater crisis
Groundwater supplies in the world's driest regions are approaching the point of crisis according to a recent commentary in the journal Nature Climate Change. Famiglietti (2014) at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory shows satellite data confirming that the amount of water stored in seven of the world's major aquifers declined drastically since the early 2000s (see chart). Many of these regions are grappling with drought. Californian farmers are facing unprecedented water cutbacks (Greenwire) and in September a new bill was passed concerning management of groundwater on a statewide basis. Northern China is in the midst of its worst drought in 60 years and armed bandits are institution illegal "water taxes" on small villages in India (Greenwire). Famiglietti says that "It's worse than people realize in part because declining groundwater reserves don't normally get included in assessments of drought" (Climatewire). While reversing climate change is not a possibility, managing our groundwater is. 

Big global aquifers have headed in one direction in recent years: down

Source: Famiglietti (2014).
Management
A key factor in groundwater depletion is that water laws do not do much to manage aquifers. Active water management requires collaboration across institutional levels and public debate on how to allocate and preserve the remaining water ecosystem so it benefits all parties. Groundwater monitoring and management has been very neglected in most parts of the world where aquifers serve as a crucial source of supply for irrigated agriculture and cities. If not handled properly, the results will likely be rising food prices that in worst case scenario could lead to hunger and civil unrest (NECSI).

 Conflict
World Food Program, 2009
Conflict over water is not a new phenomena but it may become more common as climate change and population growth increases pressure on fresh water resources. Some argue that there has been an increase in water-related violence globally, in relation to development projects and economic activities (Pacific Institute). The devastating civil war that began in Syria in 2011 had a direct link to water scarcity and climatic conditions, six year drought, that played a role in the deterioration of Syria's economic conditions and led to mass migrations of rural communities into cities (Gleick, 2014). In 2012, scientists from New England Complex Systems Institute warned about the risk of rising food prices, FAO food price index above 210, leading to civil unrest and riots across the globe. 

Food prices (black line) and food riots and the Arab Spring (red lines)
Source: M. Lagi, K.Z. Bertrand, Y. Bar-Yam, 2011

Conclusion
Climate change redistributes water around the planet, with dry areas becoming dryer and wet areas getting wetter (i.e. droughts and floods become more common). This puts extra stress on fresh water ecosystems and reservoirs. Combined with population growth and water mismanagement this can lead to a water crisis that puts extra pressure on a society and in combination with other factors contribute to full scale conflict, especially in cases of trans-boundary water resources. Countries with little resilience to such shocks are thus most vulnerable to a changing climate. This subject area is poorly understood and needs to be researched further as we head into uncertain times.
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Growth in what?

Redefining Capitalism?

More and more organisations are waking up to the fact that growth in GDP in itself is not a sufficient condition to make a country more prosperous. Something that many ecological economists have been saying for decades. Because many western countries economies are now contracting or struggling to simply stay put, while inequalities are growing, conventional economists are having to admit to capitalism's dark sides. In a recent article, on McKinsey's website, Beinhocker and Hauer (2014) confirms the faulty equilibrium model that neo-classicists have based their theory on. The economy is, as many non-conventional economists have argued, a complex, dynamic, open, and nonlinear system. Similar to that of an ecosystem. And moreover the economy is only a part of larger system. These insights have fundamental implications for how people think about the nature of capitalism and prosperity.

Different types of capital
It is not simply that the economy is a networked system of interacting agents with flows of resources and complex behavioural rules. The economy has to be further understood as  a subsystem of our societies and the biosphere. Meaning that there is not only one type of capital (financial) that matters to the prosperity of a community, city or nation. Social capital (e.g. trust, equality, transparency), natural capital (ecosystem services) and knowledge capital (education, research etc) are part of the overall wealth equation too. Without much natural capital the resource base for providing primary goods such as food, drinking water, fuel, clothes and homes is poor and makes societies less able to withstand shocks from natural variabilities (e.g. floods, droughts) and climate change. This in turn effects the overall economy as, for example, natural resources becomes more expensive - prices goes up and people won't afford to spend as much on secondary goods. In a society where there is little trust and transparency, transaction costs are high and investments low. Social capital is the glue which keeps a society together, that enables cooperation. Without it, a society becomes unstable and could lead to political turbulence. This is why inequality is such a major problem, also from an economics perspective. Research and eduction also greatly affects an economy's long-term success. Without knowledge capital there would be little innovation and few new industries or areas of expertise offering comparative advantage. 


Figure 1. Ecosystems sustain societies that create economies and generate knowledge
Source: Living Planet (2014)
Growth in what?
Now that we know that there are several aspects which are important to the overall wealth and stability of a nation, what is it that we want to grow? Achieving a prosperous society ought to entail keeping a balance between the different forms of capital so to ensure resilience of the overall economy. Moreover, by understanding that the economy is a complex adaptive system we can analyse its pathway from a different perspective. Once again making the economy to just a tool for achieving something larger than just GDP growth in and of itself. If you look at most societies, values and policies that rank as most important include: low unemployment, safety, free speech, fair wages and elections, education, health and equal opportunities to all spheres of social life. So what is it that we want more of, that should grow? Well, in many western societies we want to grow our social, natural and knowledge capital! And not the other way around, as we are doing now, degrading these forms of capital based on the misconception that it is the financial capital that makes for the wealth of a nation. 

References and reading tips:
Beinhocker, E. and Hanauer, N. (2014). Redefining capitalism. McKinsey Courterly.
Dean, B (2014). Greens face problem with economic ‘growth’ framing. Open Economy.
Jackson, Tim (2009). Prosperity without growth? - the transition to a sustainable economy. Sustainable Development Commission UK, Report.
WWF (2014). Living Planet Report.
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Living Planet?

“Biodiversity is the totality of all inherited variation in the life forms of Earth, of which we are one species. We study and save it to our great benefit. We ignore and degrade it to our great peril.” — E.O. Wilson


State of global biodiversity

Today the World Wildlife Fund - Living Planet Report 2014 - was released. This latest edition shows that since 1970 population sizes of vertebrates (mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and fish) have dropped by 52%. Many see this as yet another sign of that we might be in the middle of a sixth mass extinction event in Earth’s history. This post will therefore deal with the topic of biodiversity.

What is biodiversity?

Biological diversity (i.e. biodiversity) reflects the number, variety and variability of living organisms. It includes diversity within species, between species, and among ecosystems. The concept also covers how this diversity changes from one location to another and over time. Indicators such as the number of species in a given area can help in monitoring certain aspects of biodiversity. When one wants to understand the health of an entire ecosystem, however, some species may be more important than others in the sense that they provide a key function within the entire system. Ecologist often refer to such species as keystone species. Take for example the otter. They are considered a keystone species because of their critical importance to the health and stability of nearshore marine ecosystems. Otters eat sea urchins and other invertebrates that graze on giant kelp. Without sea otters, these grazing animals can destroy kelp forests and consequently the wide diversity of animals that depend upon kelp habitat for survival (Fig. 1). Additionally, kelp forests protect coastlines from storm surge and absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Fig. 1 The difference in a marine ecosystem with and without Sea otters
Source: seaotters.com

Threats

Some of the main threats to biodiversity include: invasive species, climate change, nutrient loading and pollution, habitat change, and overexploitation. These are direct drivers of change, but there are also indirect drivers of change. Such as demographics, urbanization, transportation, agriculture, trade and many more. With higher interconnectivity on the planet, species loss may occur at a faster rate. In a recent study Lenzen et al. (2012) showed that some 30% of biodiversity threats could be attributed to international trade by mapping out supply chains around the globe (Fig. 2).

Fig. 2 Example of flow map of species threats caused by trade

Source: Lenzen et al. 2012

What defines a mass extinction?

Of the four billion species estimated to have evolved on the Earth over the last 3.5 billion years, some 99% died out (Novacek, 2001). Extinctions are common but normally it is balanced by speciation. Sometimes, however, the balance wavers such that extinction rates become elevated. Palaeontologists characterize mass extinctions as times when the Earth loses more than 75% of its species in a geologically short interval (due to e.g. super-eruptions, impacts of asteroids, global climate changes, continent drifts), as has happened only five times in the past 540 million years (Barnosky et al., 2011). Lately biologists have been suggesting that a sixth mass extinction may be under way. By comparing the rates and amounts of extinction during those earlier events with the range of species losses over the past few centuries in human times, scientist find a similar trend. According to evolutionists like E.O. Wilson and N. Eldredge we thus have evidence that humans are now causing a mass extinction. Through a mix of impacting activities such as habitat destruction, overpopulation, chemical pollution, overexploitation of resources etc. humans have produced the conditions for a serious biodiversity crisis. According to an article in Nature (2011), Earth could reach the mass extinction levels (75%) within just a few centuries if current threats to many species are not alleviated (Barnosky et al., 2011).


Fig. 3 Graphic illustration of threatened species globally
graphics biodiversity loss
Source: NYT graphics editor Bill Marsh

Amphibians

Here I want to make a case for the amphibians of the planet since they are some of the most vulnerable and endangered, and people generally ignore them. The latest figures from the International Union Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species show that there are nearly as many threatened species of amphibians (30%) as birds (12.5%) and mammals (20.6%) combined (iucnredlist.org). Most of the world’s amphibian species are located in tropical regions, especially the Amazon Rainforest (Fig. 4). In the past three decades declines in populations of amphibians have occurred worldwide due to for example: habitat destruction, pollution & pesticides, disease, and changing precipitation patterns.

 
Fig. 4 Global assessment (2004)

In Sweden all native amphibians and reptiles are protected by law (2007:845) with the conditions not to kill, harm, capture or destroy their habitat. Naturskyddsföreningen and SLU have nominated 2014 to be the year of the frog, focusing on collecting data on amphibians and educating the public. Many of our frogs in the South are critically endangered while others can be found nation wide.

Why it matters

Biodiversity underpins ecosystem functioning and the provision of ecosystem services. Ecosystem services such as water purification, pollination, storm protection, nutrient cycling, and climate regulation are essential for human well-being. Undermining diversity of life on Earth thus implies undermining our own well-being. Moreover, according to some studies (e.g. TEEB, 2010) there is a strong link between biodiversity loss and poverty. Why? Because the world’s poor, especially subsistence farmers and pastoralists are the first to suffer from the loss of free services provided by ecosystems and biodiversity. In rich countries people substitute natural nutrient cycling, pest control and pollination by buying expensive fertilizers, pesticides and renting bees/pollinating by hand. Because we don't value the services nature provides for us we often end up in a position where we have to pay more to restore ecosystems than if we had used preventive measures from the beginning. This is the case with the Baltic Sea which is today home to seven of the world's 10 largest marine dead zones due to eutrophication and overfishing leading to hypoxia. Trying to restore parts of the Baltic Sea to it's former conditions is a complex issue and attempts have yet to succeed. And for those who think Sweden is such a environmentally sound country, perhaps you should read the Living Planet Report (2014) which states that Sweden climbed from place 13 to 10 on the list over countries average ecological footprint in the world. Now Swedes need 3,7 planets to satisfy their lifestyle.
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