The problem
Over the last two years, we’ve seen irrefutable evidence[1] that climate change and the extinction crisis are real and are causing significant social turmoil. There has been both direct disruption, such as the increase in extreme weather events, and indirect, such as the rise in more dramatic events driven by biodiversity loss which increase the likelihood of zoonotic diseases which pass from animals to humans, such as COVID-19.
It’s now hard to imagine a day without a headline about the environmental emergency. Especially the pressing rise in global temperatures – with the world on average having already heated by 1.0C since the pre-industrial era. To put this into context, at a temperature rise of 1.5°C, it is estimated that 14% of the world’s population will be hit by severe heatwaves once every five years. At 2°C, this number jumps to more than a third of the global population.[2]
The biodiversity crisis is often overlooked relative to climate change, but is perhaps even more pressing; one million, or a quarter of all known species[3], are threatened with extinction by 2050.
