A worrying evolution of species and a mixed state of natural environments, ongoing destruction of natural habitats, resistant pollution, rapidly growing invasive alien species, and intensifying knowledge, prevention and control actions: this is the 2016 biodiversity situation.
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Boreal, temperate, tropical or equatorial, the forest is an essential ecosystem on the continents, a place of refuge for fauna and flora. Of the 2 million known species on Earth, more than half live in a tropical forest. However, the forest is going through difficult times, between deforestation and
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Pollinators, which are essential for securing the world's food supply, are threatened with extinction, warns the IPBES in its first report, pointing to neonicotinoid insecticides as one of the factors in the decline of bees. "The Global Assessment on Pollinators, Pollination and Food Production," the name of the first report developed by the Intergovernmental Scientific and Technical Platform on Pollinators, Pollination and Food Production (IPBES), is a global assessment of the impact of neonicotinoid insecticides on bees.
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Did you know that more than 150 million tonnes of plastic waste floats on the oceans (1) and that the mass of this waste could double by 2050? The use of plastics increased 20-fold in the second half of the 20th century and is expected to double again over the next 20 years.
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A new exploration technique has just revealed an unsuspected biodiversity that is shaking up our biological knowledge. Dark "organic" matter in which the clues to a fourth domain of life could be hidden. Have biologists missed 85 to 99 % of the microorganisms living on Earth?
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UNESCO World Heritage threatened by industry. In a report published on Wednesday 6 April, WWF sounded the alarm. According to the NGO, half of the treasures of humanity's World Heritage, these emblems of biodiversity - 114 out of 229 protected sites - are now under threat.
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In ten years in the Mediterranean, the biomass of sardines has been divided by three, from over 200,000 tonnes to less than 67,000 tonnes. The same proportions are found in anchovies. But where are these small fish - also known as "small pelagics" - to be found?
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The decree putting an end to disposable plastic bags is published today in the official gazette. This text gives substance to the Ministry of Ecology's ambition to reduce the considerable environmental impacts linked to the production and distribution of these bags. The ban was foreseen in the
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Researchers from the "7th Continent Expedition" team have just demonstrated for the first time in the world that microplastics break down to become nano particles. No ocean is untouched by the massive presence of plastics that carry endocrine disruptors, heavy metals, pollutants and are so many traps for
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On paper, bees should rejoice: their main enemy, responsible for the death of 300,000 hives a year, pesticides from the neonicotinoid family have been banned. During the second reading of the biodiversity law in the House of Commons, MEPs adopted a
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The third session of the cycle Les Boullimics à l'école Boule welcomes Pierre-Henri Gouyon, evolutionary biologist at the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, this Wednesday, March 23rd from 5:30 pm to 7:30 pm For 40 years, the natural abundance of living species has been doubled by human "genetic creations":
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Three months after the Paris conference that led to the adoption of a climate agreement, the international community is embarking on a new project: the development of a binding legal instrument on the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity in areas beyond national jurisdiction (Beyond National Jurisdiction). While the
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It took 44 years for crime against nature to finally become part of French law. The National Assembly has just adopted this Tuesday, March 15, in the bill on biodiversity, an article introducing the recognition of ecological damage. A major step forward in the law on
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Pollinators have never been more threatened, and humanity has never needed them more: this is the conclusion of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) in its first report published on Friday 26 February on the occasion of its fourth plenary meeting in Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia).
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West Africa. A chimpanzee approaches a tall tree. He squats down and puts himself in meditation (in prayer?) for a long time. Then, suddenly, he gets up, takes a large stone and places it on a mound of other stones already arranged by his fellow chimpanzees at the foot of the tree. Shouts
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For the first time in France, all the data on the quality of river water can be consulted from the water's edge thanks to a new "river quality" application. The water agencies and ONEMA are enriching their mobile application on river quality with the
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Biodiversity is currently undergoing one of its most significant alterations: the current extinction rates of animal species are 100 to 1,000 times higher than those recorded from fossil records. They concern all types of species - birds, reptiles, mammals. The primordial role of human activities in this phenomenon
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The Ecole Boulle de Paris hosts three conferences on living worlds. This cycle Les BOULLIMICS shows how nature, the body and the brain are nowadays kneaded and reconfigured by our biotechniques. Synthetic life colonizes our organisms and our imaginations. Artists, designers, biohackers, engineers, biologists... invent organic objects...
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Are we on the verge of a 6th species extinction crisis? Scientists estimate that 60 % of global ecosystem services are being degraded. COP 21 has just concluded, reaffirming the importance of biodiversity for adaptation and the fight against climate change, thus confirming the importance of biodiversity for
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The NGO WWF has just published an alarming report which affirms, with supporting evidence, the state of burn-out in the Mediterranean. This inland sea so dear to our culture, which is home to more than 150 million people on its coasts and shelters between 4 and 17 % of known marine species do not have the capacity to support the development of the Mediterranean Sea.
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