Report: Fragile biodiversity, handle with care

The report Fragile Biodiversity, Handle with Care: Status, Trends, Threats and Solutions for a Nature-Positive Future highlights — drawing on current data, databases, and available studies — the overall state of biodiversity in Italy, outlining both the threats and the best solutions we have today to reverse the trend and commit to a path of biodiversity restoration and conservation, as called for by the world and by Europe.

Fragility

According to the National Red Lists for flora from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), around 89% of Italy’s habitats of community interest are in an unfavourable conservation status. Of the 43 Italian forest habitats, for example, 5 are classified as “critically endangered” and 12 as “endangered.” Overall, 68% of Italian ecosystems are endangered, with 35% in critical danger. In the Po Valley ecoregion, 100% of ecosystems are at risk. The figure is 92% in the Adriatic ecoregion and 82% in the Tyrrhenian ecoregion. 

Furthermore, 57% of rivers and 80% of lakes are in poor ecological condition. And the figures for species conservation status are no less alarming: 30% of vertebrate animal species and 25% of marine animal species in the Mediterranean are at risk of extinction. 

Solutions

The WWF report also issues a call to action: it is essential to take concrete steps now by immediately implementing the National Biodiversity Strategy to 2030, which calls for at least 30% of species and habitats of community interest currently in an unsatisfactory conservation status to achieve a favourable status by 2030. The strategy also aims to protect ecosystems by increasing protected areas to cover 30% of both terrestrial and marine territory, and to restore 30% of currently degraded ecosystems. For each environment in need of protection, the WWF report outlines practical solutions: from recovering and restoring wetlands, to strengthening the monitoring network for surface and groundwater, from the urgent need for a Climate Crisis Adaptation Plan that promotes Nature-Based Solutions, to sustainable forest management, from drastically reducing pesticide use in agriculture to expanding the surface area of marine protected zones. 

Now more than ever, it is crucial for everyone — starting with civil society — to take action, to pull the crisis of natural systems out of the shadows that prevent citizens from grasping its full scale, and to compel institutions to act, giving nature the priority it truly holds for both our present and our future.