1.Beavers are a protected species in England now. To capture or kill beaver is illegal as they are known “ecosystem engineers“ by ecologists.
2. Animals, trees & rivers are to be given legal status. In Spain, Bolivia & Ecuador they are to be treated as a person. Already a n endangered lagoon is granted the status of a living being.
3. Climate crisis topped with Lithium mining in South America are impacting the threatened flamingo species. Bright flamingo flocks are called a’ flamboyance’- but as their wetlands, foraging, nesting grounds now shrink, these birds are growing vulnerable.
4. New Zealand proposes to tax livestock burps, farts. Prime Minister Jacinda Arden said the levy would be the first of its kind in the world. Gasses naturally emitted by New Zealand’s 6.2 million cows are among the country’s biggest environmental threats.
5. The World Wildlife Fund for Nature (WWF) recently released its ‘Living Planet Report 2022’. This finds a 69% decline in wildlife population between1970 & 2018. The crisis is caused by the Anthropocene, known as the era of sprawling human impacts, extending from heating Earth’s atmosphere to making oceans acidic & destroying habitat.