Biodiversity is a fancy word perhaps, but you can see what it means. 'Bio' means 'life' and you know what diversity means, don't you? You know, lots of variety. By destroying so many of the places where different types (species) of life live, humans are condemning them to death... to extinction. This means that the number of species gets smaller and biodiversity becomes less.


Biodiversity is very important for people, even though most of you don't know it. Why? Well think about food farmers grow. Once, there were hundreds of different food plants but now, most farmers depend on just half a dozen or so for most of their food crops: things like soybeans, corn (maize), wheat, rice, canola (rapeseed) and potatoes. Most of these crops are based on just a few varieties (types like red- or white-skinned potatoes). And, increasingly, the seeds for these are controlled and even owned - patented - by a few giant biotechnology corporations who have created new varieties by genetic engineering.

But what happens if a new type of killer disease like, for example, potato blight comes along and wipes out all the identical potatoes? Millions of people would go very hungry indeed. Biodiversity - and making sure you keep it - means that you always have a backup in the form of another variety of crop which isn't killed by any new disease plague.

Biodiversity is also vital in ways which people are only just beginning to understand - in the web of life. If you kill some of the life forms, you cut the web and it could collapse. This web means we - all of life - are all interdependent. We are all connected in some way. And people are no different for all their cleverness.