We Risk Living in an 'Empty World' If Assault on Nature Not Stopped, Warns UN Biodiversity Chief

This article is yet another powerful wake-up call. Here again the truth is highlighted: "If our support systems are gone, there will be no humans." We all need to be doing the deep work of integrating this fact. This is courageous work. And it has compelled myself and millions of others to be part of the Great Awakening and the fierce commitment to doing our part, whatever that is for each and every one of us, to transform and save ourselves and our Earth Mother. Every single one of us can do our moral and civic duty and assume responsibility through choosing to unite and embrace the vision and the values of a radically different world — one which holds all life with reverence rather than enabling its destruction. Settling for anything less than radical change NOW is being complicit with leaving our children an "empty world" and an increasingly uninhabitable planet. Anyone who tries to say that we "can't afford" dramatic comprehensive changes like the Green New Deal and keeping the oil in the ground is, whether they know it or not, being complicit with the Merchants of Death and acting in ways which serve to doom life on this beautiful hurting planet that is our Sacred Home. Let us all instead choose Life and Love with every fiber of our being. Everything, absolutely everything, that we love and cherish is at stake. — Molly

"If our support systems are gone, there will be no humans."

By

Eoin Higgins

If humanity doesn't take action now, we will be left to survive on an "empty world."

That's the warning from new United Nations biodiversity chief Elizabeth Maruma Mrema. 

In an interview with the Guardian Monday, Mrema declared that unless the world takes action, the complex system of biodiversity that sustains life on the planet will collapse, taking it with it much of the "prerequisites for human health and livelihoods."

That doesn't leave much hope for the continuation of human civilization.

"People's lives depend on biodiversity in ways that are not always apparent or appreciated," said Mrema. "Human health ultimately depends on ecosystem services: the availability of fresh water, fuel, food sources."

Mrema gave the interview to the Guardian on the eve of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. The forum, which began today and goes through Friday, has already been the scene of climate protests and demands for immediate action to address the global environmental crisis.

"My friend and colleague Elizabeth Mrema is absolutely right," tweeted U.N. Environmental Program executive director Inger Andersen. "2020 is not a 'year of conferences,' but a real opportunity for us to stop and indeed reverse ecological devastation." 

If world governments and leader continue to have an insufficient response to the climate crisis, Mrema warned, the world could be win for major, "catastrophic" consequences.

"The global community will have said: let biodiversity loss continue, let people continue to die, let the degradation continue, deforestation continue, pollution continue, and we'll have given up as an international community to save the planet," said Mrema. "I hope that's not where any of us would want to be."

Please continue this article here: https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/01/21/we-risk-living-empty-world-if-assault-nature-not-stopped-warns-un-biodiversity-chief