Nature and Biodiversity

Nature embodies concepts including biodiversity, ecosystems, Mother Earth, and systems of life. Nature contributes ecosystem goods and services, and gifts including beauty and spiritual refreshment. Both nature and nature’s contributions to people are vital for human existence and for a good quality of life often described as human well-being, living in harmony with nature, or living well in balance and harmony with Mother Earth. Bahá'u'lláh described the countryside as the world of the soul. While more food, energy and materials than ever before are now being supplied to people in most places, this is increasingly at the expense of nature’s ability to provide such contributions in the future and frequently undermines nature’s many other contributions and ecosystem services, which range from water quality regulation to sense of place. The biosphere, upon which humanity as a whole depends, is being altered to an unparalleled degree across all spatial scales. Biodiversity – the diversity within species, between species and of ecosystems – is declining faster than at any time in human history, with one million species threatened in the immediate future. Since all the energy in organic materials, apart from a few microbes living on geothermal or deep sea chemical energy, is solar energy trapped by photosynthesis, imagine what would happen if plant life was so destroyed that there was no longer enough food for all living things including us. This is a crisis as serious and threatening as climate change.

WHAT IS BIODIVERSITY

"Bio" means life, so biology is the study or knowledge of life, biography means writing the story of a life, and biodiversity is the diversity of life as species, genes and ecosystems. We are still far from understanding the diversity of life on this planet while already destroying it. Of about 8 million described species, one million are threatened with extinction. We are only beginning to discover the diversity of millions of forms of microbial life, being revealed in part through exploration of genetic material (DNA) that must come from different organisms.

Just think of all the genetic diversity within species, for example in all the races of dogs that exist today through human intervention. The human species Homo sapiens is equally diverse, with every combination able to make wonderful children. Diversity is an advantage because it allows adaptation to a wide range of environments and situations, which is why it is so common in nature and in humans.

No form of life really lives alone. All make up communities featuring cooperation and reciprocity, driven by energy flowing through the relationships between primary producers, consumers and decomposers. In nature, within the constraints of available resources, species and communities make up complex ecosystems across the planet, with the most evolved forms including tropical rainforests and coral reefs with thousands of species and high productivity. We benefit in many ways from the ecosystem services so provided.

The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) is the global agreement through which states are addressing the biodiversity challenge since its adoption in 1992. At its fifteenth Conference of the Parties (COP15), in December 2022, it adopted a Global Biodiversity Framework to set goals and targets for action by countries around the world.

The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) is the scientific advisory body to the CBD. Involving hundreds of scientists, it prepares reports on the state of biodiversity in the world, and special reports on specific issues requested by the conferences of the parties, such as on the values of biodiversity and sustainable use of wild species. It has produced two recent assessments, a Thematic Assessment Report on the Interlinkages among Biodiversity, Water, Food, and Health (Nexus Assessment), and a Thematic Assessment Report on the Underlying Causes of Biodiversity Loss and the Determinants of Transformative Change and Options for Achieving the 2050 Vision for Biodiversity (Transformative Change Assessment).

The United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration runs from 2021–2030. Its purpose is to promote the United Nation's environmental goals by preventing, halting and reversing the degradation of nature and ecosystems world-wide. As with many other planetary resources being raped and pillaged for short-term profit, most natural habitats are under great pressure, with only fragments surviving. We now need global cooperation for the regeneration of natural areas and the restoration of degraded and destroyed ecosystems and their unique species before it is too late.

IEF AND BIODIVERSITY

The IEF considers the biodiversity crisis, along with climate change, and chemical pollution and waste, as environmental issues of high priority requiring urgent action. The IEF is accredited to the CBD and is following this process and reporting to its members. IEF members also contribute in their professional capacity to IPBES.

Nature also has an important place in the Bahá'í Faith, and the Bahá'í Writings are full of metaphors drawn from nature. There is thus great potential to explore the complementarity and mutual enrichment of science and religion in this area. The IEF website has many resources to encourage this, and it undertakes many activities and reports on challenges and progress in biodiversity conservation and management.

RESOURCES ON BIODIVERSITY

NEWS AND POSTS

Most recent first

IPBES Transformative Change Assessment, 6 May 2025

To be continued

Microbial extinction is happening, blog by Arthur Dahl, 16 July 2023

Community-based coral adaptation approaches in Fiji, 27 May 2023

How forests benefit people and planet, UN Forum on Forests, 8-12 May 2023

Conservation and sustainable use of marine biological diversity, 6 March 2023

The other energy crisis, blog by Arthur Dahl, 22 February 2023

Regenerative Agriculture, Earth4All paper, Club of Rome, 18 February 2023

Chile Temple: Promoting a harmonious relationship with the natural world, 11 January 2023

Sylvia Karlsson-Vinkhuyzen at CBD COP15, 10 January 2023

Global Biodiversity Framework Adopted 18 December 2022

One Planet, One Habitation: A Bahá’í Perspective on Recasting Humanity's Relationship with the Natural World, 16 December 2022

IEF member profile: Austin Bowden-Kerby, Fiji, coral reefs, 29 November 2022

Film about coral reef restoration project screened at COP27, 18 November 2022

Green nature is good for you, blue is better, blog by Arthur Dahl, 15 August 2022

Biodiversity Values Assessment 2022, excerpts and commentary, prepared by the IPBES to link science and values, including Indigenous and spiritual values

IPBES Values Assessment: Multiple values of nature and its benefits, 11 July 2022

Climate Change, Global Pollution, Biodiversity: Can we turn the corner?, video with Arthur Dahl, 7 April 2022

UN Biodiversity Conference begins, 11-15 October 2021

Global Status of Coral Reefs, 5 October 2021

Concern at low ambition of biodiversity negotiations, September 2021

Secure and Equitable, Nature Positive, Net Zero World
Non-State Actors' Call for Governments to Strengthen the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework, August 2021

IEF Statement March 2021
Ethical Commitment to Protect Nature and its Biodiversity

Commentary in a Bahá'í perspective on
The Economics of Biodiversity: The Dasgupta Review 2021

Ecosystem Accounting Takes Off 2021

World Conservation Congresses in September, August 2021

Active Coral Restoration: Techniques for a Changing Planet, 3 April 2021

Working to save islands and coral reefs from climate change, March 2021

Faith for Nature, Conference in Iceland,
5-8 October 2020

Bahá'í Faith and Biodiversity, BIC contribution to UNEP, 28 September 2020

The Global Sustainability Challenge: A Systems View of Agriculture, Arthur Dahl for Agriculture Working Group, Association for Bahá'í Studies, 27 September 2020

2020 Faith Call to Action for UN Biodiversity Summit, 9 September 2020

Austin Bowden-Kerby and coral conservation, article in The Guardian 20 June 2020

State of the World's Forests 2020, FAO/UNEP, June 2020

Deforestation and COVID-19: Emerging understanding of planetary and human health linkages, by IEF Member Michael Richards, May 2020

Applying the hard lessons of coronavirus to the biodiversity crisis, UNDP, 27 March 2020

IEF and Biodiversity, launch of a new thematic issue, May 2019

Global Assessment on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services 2019

Spiritual Approach to Ecology - Approche spirituelle de l'écologie, Arthur Dahl, May 2016

Report on Triglav Circle, Role of Nature, Montézillon, Switzerland, 14-15 June 2014