Selection 20 Summary

Impact of Biodiversity Loss on Ocean Ecosystem Services by Boris Worm is about the benefits we get from a high biodiversity. He begins by detailing the loss of population and species in marine ecosystems by human domination. He did experiments and found that that the loss is impairing the oceans ability to provide food, maintain water quality and recover from damage, but it is all still reversible at this point.He then describes the role of biodiversity in an ecosystem. Surveys suggest that it enhances the productivity and stability of an ecosystem. But we do not know the importance on a landscape level. Increasing population of people on the coast so loss of ocean services would be a disaster. He then Details the experiments he conducted to understand the relationship between biodiversity and ecosystem functions and services. In 36 experiments it was found that an increase in biodiversity correlated with an increase in all the processes of the ecosystem. He then studied the record of economically important coastal organisms. He saw huge declines in population This has impaired the processes of coastal ecosystem. He then went larger scale and looked at info on fishing in 64 large marine ecosystems world wide from the U.N. data base. Those that had higher biodiversity were more resistant to collapse and overfishing. This implies that different species play complementary roles to each others survival. He then analyzed data from 44 marine reserves to find if there is chances of recovering from a collapse.He found that it is possible to recover which brings more revenue for the area. He concludes that through sustainable management , pollution control we can invest in the productivity and reliability of the goods the oceans can provide.