BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION AND ECOSYSTEM SERVICES FOR NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT

ABSTRACT 

The most amazing feature of Earth is the existence of life, and the most extraordinary feature of life is its diversity. Human beings can coexist only with the abundance of and diversity of nature. It is widely acknowledged that biodiversity underpins ecosystem functioning and that the provisioning of ecosystem services is essential for human well-being. The relationship between biodiversity and ecosystem services is not straightforward, whether more biodiversity would imply more ecosystem services depends largely on the type of ecosystem service .It should be noted that Global efforts to conserve biodiversity have the potential to deliver economic benefits to people (i.e., ‘‘ecosystem services’’). However, regions for which conservation benefits both biodiversity and ecosystem services cannot be identified unless ecosystem services can be quantified and valued and their areas of production mapped. Certain changes in biodiversity often alter ecosystem processes and change the resilience of ecosystems to environmental change.

Table of Contents

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Certification…………………………………………………………i

Dedication……………………………………………………..ii

Acknowledgement…………………………………………………..iii

Abstract……………………………………………………………...iv

Table of Contents……………………………………………...v

1.0      Introduction ………………………………………………………….1

     Biodiversity ………………………………………………………3

2.1 Types of biodiversity ……….………………………………………………4

2.2     Importance of biodiversity…………………………………………………..6

2.3Loss in biodiversity……………………………7

2.4 Biodiversity conservation ………………………………………10

2.5 Conservation measures of biodiversity……………………………10

2.6 Maintaining biodiversity ……………………………………………………..13

3.0 Ecosystem and Ecosystem services …………………………………14

3.1 Services provided by ecosystem…………………………………….15 

4.0    International biodiversity conventions ………………………………19

5.0 Indices of national development ………………………………………20

CONCLUSION……………………………………………………………..21

REFERENCES………………………………………………………………….......22