1,700 Bird, Animal Species Face Extinction In Next 50 Years, Thanks To Human Encroachment

Recently, a study had shown that in nearly 5 decades since 1970, 60% of mammals, birds, fish and reptile species were wiped out from the face of out planet, due to human activity.

As scary as it sounds, there is more bad news for the ecology and well being of the planet.

AFP

Nearly 1,700 species of amphibians, birds and mammals are likely to lose their natural habitats and face greater extinction risk by 2070 due to increased human land use.

A study by Ecologists at Yale University has warned that in the next 50 years 886 species of amphibians, 436 birds and 376 mammals could go extinct due to habitat loss.

AFP

The report which was published in the journal Nature Climate Change predicted that these species will lose 30-50 percent of their present habitat in the next 50 years.

Among them are species whose fates will be particularly dire, such as the Lombok cross frog (Indonesia), the Nile lechwe (South Sudan), the pale-browed treehunter (Brazil) and the curve-billed reed haunter (Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay) which are all predicted to lose around half of their present day geographic range in the next five decades.

¡°Our findings link these plausible futures with their implications for biodiversity,¡± said Walter Jetz, co-author and professor of ecology and evolutionary biology and of forestry and environmental studies at Yale. ¡°Our analyses allow us to track how political and economic decisions ¡ª through their associated changes to the global land cover ¡ª are expected to cause habitat range declines in species worldwide.¡±

AFP

The study also pointed out that species in Central and East Africa, Mesoamerica, South America, and Southeast Asia will suffer the greatest habitat loss and increased extinction risk.

Earlier, The Living Planet Report 2018 by World Wildlife Fund (WWF) had found that since 1970 more than half of the animal population has been wiped out, due to the increasing human activity.