Endangered Species Affected by Global Supply Chains
The items we buy and consume can cause deadly effects for wild animals on earth. New I’ll show you a group of maps shows the endangered Species that are damaged by us.
Daniel Moran, an industrial ecologist at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, and Keiichiro Kanemoto, a colleague from Shinshu University in Japan, designed a group of maps for an article published on “Nature Ecology & Evolution” magazine to illustrate what they call “biodiversity threat hotspots”. This is Dr. Moran’s first attempt, he believes that more tools can be created on this basis, and one day countries adjust biodiversity by trade, just as some countries do with carbon emissions now.
We like a variety of goods, but the unsustainable supply has been undermining biodiversity. Over the past 500 years, about a thousand of animals we known have been extinct, most of which have been caused by the destruction of habitat. Although the estimating data may not precise, the extinction rate of today’s species is about one hundred to one thousand times higher than when humans had not yet appeared.
To visualize the impact of international trade and its impact on the environment, these maps show the collection of the supply chain of listed goods in 187 countries and 6,803 vulnerable species, endangered species, or critically endangered species. It mainly focuses on the 166 human activities that can affect all animals, and tracks the destination of these goods.
Europe and the U.S. pose a great threat to marine life in Southeast Asia, many wild animals in there are killed by hunters from almost all around the world. Rich biodiversity may bring many economic activities, and that leads to more threats. In general, it is not the same case in Europe and the U.S., because the biodiversity of these places has been drastically reduced due to the large human population.
In my opinion, in order to reduce the threat to the wildlife species, consumers can ask for goods with labels of sustainable production. The threat on wildlife species is mostly due to food and fiber products, such as palm oil, unsustainable coffee and tea, paper, wood and cotton.
Sources:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/01/170104103604.htm
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-016-0023
Picture:
