Bio-diversity: importance, loss and conservation

Abstract

Exactly how many species of life exists is not Imown to anybody. Estimate ranges from 3 million to 100 million. There are 1,435,662 identified species all over the world, however, a large number of species are still unidentified. They include 7,51,000 species of insects, 2,48,000 of flowering plants, 2,81,000 of animals, 68,000 of fungi, 26,000 of algae, 4,800 of bacteria and 1,000 of viruses. Approximately 27,000 species become extinct every year due to loss of ecosystem, Majority of them are small tropical organisms. If this trend of bio-diversity depletion continues, 25 per cent of the world's species may vanish by the year 2050.