The web of life, our biological diversity, is unravelling at a speed which nature can no longer sustain.

The speed at which species are disappearing as their habitats turn hostile is far beyond the rate of natural extinctions. Ecosystems are threatened by pollution, over-harvesting and non-native species. They are being split into smaller, unconnected pieces which further weakens their resilience.

Species which are specialised to a particular environment or set of circumstances may be unable to adapt or migrate when pollution or over-exploitation disrupt their living space.

There is a term in the biology world for any survivors. They are ‘relict’, which makes them remnants of a formerly widespread species now restricted to very isolated areas, making them both vulnerable and insignificant as a population.

Some fear future generations may well have nothing left but video clips of creatures that once inhabited earth.

This year was to have been the target for reversing the trend of biodiversity loss... instead we seem to be slipping backwards.

Declared by the United Nations eight years ago as the year of biodiversity, 2010 was to be a target year for change. The pressures leading to loss of species have not eased up, and in many areas are on the increase.

Back in May, UN secretary general Ban Ki-Moon warned that the consequences of this collective failure, if not quickly corrected, would be severe for everyone:

“Biodiversity underpins the functioning of the ecosystems on which we depend for food and fresh water, health and recreation, and protection from natural disasters. Its loss also affects us culturally and spiritually. This may be more difficult to quantify, but is nonetheless integral to our well-being,” he said.

Without swift action and renewed political will, current ‘alarming’ declines in biodiversity seem set to continue. Life-giving ocean and rainforest ecosystems could spiral towards collapse, threatening sustainable development and human well-being.

Commenting at the third global outlook on the convention of biodiversity last May, executive director of the UN Environment Programme, Achim Steiner, said:

“Humanity has fabricated the illusion that somehow we can get by without biodiversity or that it is somehow peripheral to our contemporary world. The truth is we need it more than ever on a planet of six billion heading to over nine billion people by 2050.

“Business as usual is no longer an option if we are to avoid irreversible damage to the life-support systems of our planet,” he said.

Most economies are blind to the value of diversity of animals, plants and micro-organisms and their role in healthy ecosystems.

As for our knowledge of how forests, oceans, soils and other ecosystems function, we are still only scratching the surface.

Many insects and their role in ecosystems are still waiting to be discovered. For an example of how crucial biodiversity is to humans and the environment, one only has to look at the fig-pollinating moth. Without it we would have no figs – and what would the Mediterranean be without figs?

A shaft of light is seen in the increasing number of entries in every issue of the Malta Entomological Society’s annual bulletin.

This beautifully illustrated publication, using specialised layered images, boasts a growing number of authors from Malta and abroad. In this year’s volume, 250 species are covered, of which 65 represent new records for Malta.

The beetle on the front cover of volume three, launched last week, is in grave danger of becoming extinct. David Mifsud, editor of the society’s bulletin, speaks enthusisastically about this rare weevil, of which a single species was described in the 1800s and labelled simply as coming from southern Europe.

“This species was neglected for many years. It was only recently that we discovered it is actually endemic to Gozo, where its only known habitat is the Ramla Bay area.”

The three volumes published so far by the society provide information on 370 different organisms, of which 135 species were never previously reported in Malta. Unlike most of Europe, where precise data is generally available for most groups of organisms, there has been a lack of appropriate studies locally on certain groups of insects.

Dr Mifsud said the highest species diversity is in arthopods – the branch of biology concerned with the study of insects, spiders, crustaceans and related organisms.

Global Biodiversity Outlook, the flagship publication of the convention on biological diversity, has called for the challenges of climate change and biodiversity to be tackled in a coordinated manner, giving them equal priority:

“The conservation of biodiversity makes a critical contribution to moderating the scale of climate change and reducing its negative impacts by making ecosystems – and therefore human societies – more resilient.”

Tackling the root causes of biodiversity loss will mean giving it higher priority in all areas of decision-making and in all economic sectors.