At a time of unparalleled rates of biodiversity loss, a new interconnected system to monitor biodiversity around the world is needed to guide action quickly enough to target conservation efforts to where they are most needed.
"The lethal combination of habitat loss, the exploitation of natural populations, and climate change is causing species extinction rates not seen since the last mass extinction 65 million years ago," said Prof. Andrew Gonzalez, Liber Ero Chair in Conservation Biology at McGill University and co-Chair of GEO BON. "We lack the means to monitor these impacts fast enough across most areas of the planet."
Operating much like the existing global network of weather stations that monitor climate change and its impacts, the Global Biodiversity Observing System (GBiOS), is a proposal developed by scientists from the Group of Earth Observations Biodiversity Observation Network (GEO BON), and its partners, that will combine technology, data, and knowledge from around the world to foster collaboration and data sharing among countries and to provide the data urgently needed to monitor change and target action.
Read more at McGill University
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