Has the Earth entered the sixth "mass extinction"?

PARIS.- "A rapid and imminent acceleration of the level of extinction of species". Many scientists believe that the Earth is at the beginning of the "sixth mbad extinction", the first since man inhabits the planet. According to the draft biodiversity report prepared by 150 experts from 50 countries, "between 500,000 and one million species will be at risk of extinction, many of them over the next few decades".

The 1,800-page report, on which scientists worked for three years, will be discussed at a meeting on Monday.

Paris

, France, representatives of the 130 Member States of the Intergovernmental Science and Standards Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (
IPBES).

"The global environmental heritage – the land, the oceans, the atmosphere and the biosphere – on which humanity depends, is being changed to an unprecedented level, with cascading impacts on local and regional ecosystems ", states the draft summary of the report, which may be amended in Paris.

"There is no doubt that we are moving towards the sixth mbad extinction and the first caused by man," said IPBES President Robert Watson. "But it's not something that the public can easily see," he added. "We are losing insects, forests, charismatic species, governments and the private sector must start taking biodiversity seriously, as well as warming," the scientist insisted.

One year before the scheduled meeting at

China

Among the member states of the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (COP15), many experts expect the IPBES report to be crucial for a major agreement like the one signed in Paris in 2015. against climate change.

"It will be even more difficult because people are less aware of the problems of biodiversity," said Jean-François Silvain, president of the Foundation for Biodiversity Research.

la France

. "We will have to be lucid," he added.

AFP Agency