“THE GLOBALIZATION: THREATS AND RESPONSES – PART-1”:The Services of Nature

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Lesson 26

"THE GLOBALIZATION: THREATS AND RESPONSES PART-1"

Text of handout for students

Note: In the Lectures 26, 27 on the global environment, both the threats and the possible responses to the

threats have been identified and briefly explained.

Specific data has been cited to show how each of the principal ecosystems of our planet are being rapidly and

adversely affected by excessive exploitation of natural resources.

The consequential dangers to human survival and to the survival of many species are already beginning to

become apparent through the loss of biodiversity, climate change, pollution, the spread of new diseases and

viruses and other perils.

Tangible and practical sets of actions involving policies and programmes have been spelt out.The elements in

the two lectures have been adapted from a series of publications prepared as part of the Millennium

Ecosystem Assessment series prepared by the World Resources Institute, 2005; published by Island Press,

U.S.A.

The excerpt below is provided to students purely for educational and background purposes as the elements

presented in the lectures have already been published in a special newspaper supplement produced by IUCN

The World Conservation Union on the occasion of the UN Summit held in September 2005 in New York

to make a mid-term assessment of the pace of implementation of the Millennium Development Goals.

The excerpt below is taken from the publication titled: "Living beyond our means" and stresses the vital

relationship between the support services provided by nature to humanity. It is hoped that students will use

the information and insights obtained by them from the lectures and the handout to bring about positive

change for the health and well-being of our planet earth and of humanity.

The Services of Nature

Essential to our lives

As human societies become more and more complex and technologically advanced, it is easy to gain the

impression that we no longer depend on natural systems.

A steadily increasing proportion of the population lives in cities, in environments dominated by human-built

structures and machines. Nature may appear to be something to be enjoyed at the weekend if we get the

chance, nice to have but hardly at the forefront of our daily concerns.

Even in rural areas, the conservation of natural spaces is often seen as a luxury that has little to do with the

well-being of local people -- a swamp, for example, might be viewed as wasted land, whose only value is in

the crops that could be planted if it were to be drained.

These are dangerous illusions that ignore the vast benefits of nature to the lives of the 6 billion people on the

planet. We may have distanced ourselves from nature, but we rely completely on the services it delivers.

Providing the basics:

At the most basic level, the food we eat is a service of nature. This is most obviously true when it is obtained

by harvesting wild species such as ocean fish: the healthy functioning of the food chain of the seas is an asset

of vast economic value.

Even food grown in what appear to be the most unnatural conditions, however, is still a product of the

biological processes of nature. Whether it is in the genetic material from which seeds or livestock are bred (or,

with biotechnology, altered), the soils in which crops are grown, or the water that makes the land fertile:

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human nourishment depends on a natural infrastructure underlying the skills and technology of farmers

around the world.

Apart from its role in food production, fresh water is of course another of the basics of life. For all the

ingenious channeling techniques developed since the earliest civilizations, we still rely on natural systems to

regulate the flow of water through the river basins of the world.

Even with the invention of many synthetic materials other products of nature are still used in huge quantities

in every society -- trees bring us wood and paper, the fashion industry needs plant and animals fibers, and

medicines derived from nature are in ever-greater demand.

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