biodiversity and waste management

• • biodiversity is the variety of different species of organisms on Earth, or within an ecosystem
• • high biodiversity is important because:
  • it ensures the stability of organisms becuase different species depend on each other for shelter and food
  • different species can help maintain the right physical environment for each other (e.g acidity of soil)
• • the population of the Earth is rising quickly
  • this is mainly because of modern medicine and farming, which reduced the number of people dying from disease and hunger
  • more people demand a higher standard of living, so more raw materials and energy are used quicker to manufacture luxuries like computers or cars
  • more raw materials are being used faster than they can be replaced
• • manufacturing more things produces more waste, and waste chemicals
  • this causes harmful pollution, which affects water, land and air, which reduces biodiversity
• pollution in water:

  • sewage and toxic chemicals can pollute lakes and rivers, which affects plants and animals that rely on them for survival
  • chemicals like fertilisers or pesticides can be washed into water
• • pollution in land comes from:
  • toxic chemicals from farming
  • buried nuclear waste underground
  • landfill sites
• • pollution in air comes from:
  • smoke
  • acidic gases
  • e.g sulfur dioxide can cause acid rain