Monitored wildlife populations – mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles and fish – have seen a dramatic 69% decline on average since 1970, according to the environmental group WWF’s “Living Planet Report” (LPR) 2022.
The report, released in early October 2022, highlights the stark outlook of the state of nature and urgently warns governments, businesses and the public to take transformative action to reverse the destruction of biodiversity.
The WWF said that this year’s report made use of the largest dataset yet, featuring almost 32 000 populations of 5 230 species. The Living Planet Index (LPI), provided within the report by ZSL (Zoological Society of London), shows it is within tropical regions that monitored vertebrate wildlife populations are plummeting at a particularly staggering rate.
“The WWF is extremely concerned about this trend given that these geographical areas are some of the most biodiverse in the world. In particular, the LPI data reveals that between 1970 and 2018, monitored wildlife populations in Latin America and the Caribbean region have dropped by 94% on average. In Africa, that figure is 66%,” the report stated.
Monitored freshwater populations have fallen by an average of 83% in less than a lifetime, the largest decline of any species group, with researchers agreeing that habitat loss and barriers to migration routes are responsible for around half of the threats to monitored migratory fish species.
World leaders are due to meet at the 15th Conference of Parties to the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD COP15) this December for a once-in-a-decade opportunity to course-correct for the sake of people and the planet.
The WWF is advocating for leaders to commit to a “Paris-style” agreement capable of reversing biodiversity loss to secure a nature-positive world by 2030.
One of the notable species populations captured in the LPI include the Amazon pink river dolphin population, which saw populations plummet by 65% between 1994 and 2016 in the Mamirauá Sustainable Development Reserve in the Brazilian state of Amazonas.
Others include the eastern lowland gorilla, whose numbers saw an estimated 80% decline in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s Kahuzi-Biega National Park between 1994 and 2019; and populations of the Australian sea lion, which declined by 64% between 1977 and 2019.
Globally, the report indicates that the main drivers of wildlife population decline are habitat degradation and loss, exploitation, the introduction of invasive species, pollution, climate change and disease.
Several of these factors played a part in Africa’s 66% fall in its wildlife populations over the period.
The LPR makes clear that delivering a nature-positive future will not be possible without recognising and respecting the rights, governance and conservation leadership of indigenous peoples and local communities around the world.
The report argues that increasing conservation and restoration efforts, producing and consuming food, in particular, more sustainably, and rapidly and deeply decarbonising all sectors can mitigate the twin crises. The authors call on policymakers to transform economies so that natural resources are properly valued.
CEO of WWF South Africa Dr Morné du Plessis said that “if there is one key message from this year’s ‘Living Planet Report’ it is that the evidence of the damage we are doing to biological systems is incontrovertible. Although this is depressing to environmental organisations working to reverse this decline, what should fill us with some hope is that this signal can no longer be ignored.”
“Businesses, governments, civil society and individuals must take urgent steps to protect nature and the biological systems that underpin our very existence as human beings. This is no longer an option but an imperative,” he said.
Marco Lambertini, director-general of WWF International, said: “We face the double emergencies of human-induced climate change and biodiversity loss, threatening the well-being of current and future generations.
“WWF is extremely worried by this new data showing a devastating fall in wildlife populations, in particular in tropical regions that are home to some of the most biodiverse landscapes in the world.”
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