Directions (1-5): Read the following
passage and answer the questions that follow:
Nature is like business. Business
sense dictates that we guard our capital and live from the interest. Nature’s
capital is the enormous diversity of living things. Without it, we cannot feed
ourselves, cure ourselves of illness or provide industry with the raw materials
of wealth creation. Professor Edward Wilson, of Harvard University says,
“The folly our descendants are least likely to forgive us is the ongoing
loss of genetic and species diversity. This will take millions of years to
correct.”
Only 150 plant species have ever
been widely cultivated. Yet over 75,000 edible plants are known in the wild. In
a hungry world, with a population growing by 90 million each year, so much wasted
potential is tragic. Medicines from the wild are worth around 40
billion dollars a year. Over 5000 species are known to yield chemical with
cancer fighting potential Scientists currently estimate that the total number
of species in the world is between 10-30 million with only around 1.4 million
identified.
The web of life is torn when
mankind exploits natural resources in short-sighted ways. The trade in tropical
hardwoods can destroy whole forests to extract just a few commercially
attractive specimens. Bad agricultural practice triggers 24
billion tonnes of top soil erosion a year losing the equivalent of 9 million
tonnes of grain output. Cutting this kind of unsuitable exploitation and
instituting “sustainable utilisation” will help turn the
environmental crisis around.
[WATU 316]
