Environmental News Network - Deadly Wildfires, Noise Pollution, and Disruptive Timing of Life Cycles: Un Report Identifies Looming Environmental Threats

Details: By UN Environment Programme; 18.Feb

Wildfires are burning more severely and more often, urban noise pollution is growing into a global public health menace, and phenological mismatches – disruptions in the timing of life-cycle stages in natural systems – are causing ecological consequences.

Julie Swatson

Wildfires are burning more severely and more often, urban noise pollution is growing into a global public health menace, and phenological mismatches – disruptions in the timing of life-cycle stages in natural systems – are causing ecological consequences. These critical environmental issues, requiring greater attention, are highlighted in the new Frontiers Report published today by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP).

This is the fourth edition of the Frontiers Report, which was first published in 2016 with an alert to the growing risk of zoonotic diseases, four years before the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The Frontiers Report identifies and offers solutions to three environmental issues that merit attention and action from governments and the public at large,” said Inger Andersen, Executive Director of UNEP. “Urban noise pollution, wildfires and phenological shifts – the three topics of this Frontiers report – are issues that highlight the urgent need to address the triple planetary crisis of climate change, pollution and biodiversity loss.”

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Deadly Wildfires, Noise Pollution, and Disruptive Timing of Life Cycles: Un Report Identifies Looming Environmental Threats