Rise in land use to put 1,700 species at extinction risk by 2070

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, researchers have warned.

The species include, 886 amphibians, 436 birds and 376 mammals, all of which are predicted to lose 30-50 per cent of their present habitat ranges by 2070, according to a study published in Nature Climate Change.

"Our findings link these plausible futures with their implications for biodiversity," said Walter Jetz, Professor at the Yale University in the US.

"Our analysis allows us to track how political and economic decisions -- through their associated changes to the global land cover -- are expected to cause habitat range declines in species worldwide," said Jetz.

Among those whose fates are particularly at risk are the Lombok cross frog (Indonesia), the Nile lechwe (South Sudan), the pale-browed treehunter (Brazil) and the curve-billed reedhaunter (Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay).

Also, species in Central and East Africa, Mesoamerica, South America and Southeast Asia will suffer the greatest habitat loss and increased extinction risk.

However, the losses are not only the problems of the countries within whose borders they occur, but "can irreversibly hamper the functioning of ecosystems and human quality of life," Jetz cautioned.

"While biodiversity erosion in far-away parts of the planet may not seem to affect us directly, its consequences for human livelihood can reverberate globally," he said.

For the study, the team used global decadal land use projections to evaluate potential losses in range-wide suitable habitat and extinction risks for approximately 19,400 species of amphibians, birds and mammals.

--IANS

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