Biodiversity loss is undermining global development

Goals set to alleviate extreme poverty will not be met unless we address the accelerating rate of biodiversity loss, warn UCL scientists in a paper published in the latest issue of Science . Professor James Mallet and Professor Sandra Knapp ' the co-directors of UCL's Centre for Ecology and Evolution ' have joined with scientists from the Zoological Society of London and other eminent biodiversity scientists and policy makers led by Professor Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University to draw the world's attention to the fact that development problems will not be solved if policy makers continue to ignore the environment. The scientists write that the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) aim to halve extreme poverty by 2015, but that these ambitions are being compromised by our inability to live sustainably. The authors call for more research into the complex links between biodiversity and poverty, so that informed decisions can be made about environmental services, such as land use, to the benefit of both poverty alleviation and conservation. As the world spectacularly fails to meet the targets set by the Convention on Biological Diversity to reduce biodiversity loss in 2010, the authors highlight the urgent need to set new achievable targets within the remaining MDG period. Professor Mallet said: 'Loss of biodiversity is bound to make people poorer in the long run. This policy forum document, supported and underwritten by a large number of British conservationists and biodiversity specialists, argues that we need more integrated thinking both in poverty alleviation and in biodiversity conservation.