NATIONAL THREATENED SPECIES DAY is here! And in its honor, it’s important we take a moment to acknowledge those animals in need of protection most.
Biodiversity loss is one the biggest threats facing our world. In the past 50 years alone, global wildlife decreased by nearly 70%. And today, of the 8 million total estimated number of animal and plant species, over 1 million are at risk of extinction — including 40% of amphibians, 33% of corals and marine mammals, 30% of trees, 9% of terrestrial species, potentially 10% of insects. It is a rate of decline of unprecedented scale, hundreds of times higher than the average over 10 million years, and has been dubbed the world’s sixth mass extinction.
This rate of decline has been accelerated due to the following human-driven activities:
