The Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, published in 2019 by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services [IPBES], on the global state of biodiversity, stated:
“The Earth’s biodiversity has suffered a catastrophic decline. An estimated 82 percent of wild mammal biomass has been lost, while 40 percent of amphibians, almost a third of reef-building corals, more than a third of marine mammals, and 10 percent of all insects are threatened with extinction”.
The drivers of this extinction are, in descending order: (1) changes in land and sea use; (2) direct exploitation of organisms; (3) climate change; (4) pollution, and (5) invasive alien species.[5]