Why does it matter that we’re losing biocultural diversity?

Kayapo Woman, Brazil. For decades now, the Kayapo peo­ple, and oth­ers of the Ama­zon­ian Region have been strug­gling with the avalanche of inva­sion to their lands from ille­gal log­ging, min­ing, cat­tle ranch­ing and now the con­struc­tion of the Belo Monte Dam. Photo, Cristina Mittermeier

There are many vital rea­sons why we should care.

First, we are los­ing the unique ways of life, lan­guages, and iden­ti­ties of the world’s diverse peo­ples. It’s a mat­ter of human rights. For each one of these peo­ples, it’s their right to choose their own path for devel­op­ment while main­tain­ing con­ti­nu­ity with their own past. It’s their right to “walk toward the future in the foot­steps of their ancestors”.

For human­ity at large, the loss of cul­tural and lin­guis­tic diver­sity rep­re­sents a dras­tic reduc­tion of our col­lec­tive human her­itage: a pro­found dimin­ish­ment of our under­stand­ing of what it means to be human—of the thou­sands of dif­fer­ent ways in which we can say, “I am human”. Our hori­zon as a species becomes all the nar­rower for that.

Kayapo Boy, Brazil. Photo by Cristina Mittermeier

Sec­ond, we are los­ing both the rich bio­di­ver­sity that sup­ports human­ity and all other species, and the wealth of tra­di­tional knowl­edge that helps sus­tain bio­di­ver­sity. It’s a mat­ter of sur­vival. In a time of cri­sis, we not only des­per­ately need healthy ecosys­tems. We also des­per­ately need all the voices of the planet and the ances­tral wis­dom that they express about liv­ing sus­tain­ably on Earth.

More than half of human­ity now lives in urban envi­ron­ments, largely cut off from direct con­tact with the nat­ural envi­ron­ment and from aware­ness of our con­tin­ued, inescapable inter­de­pen­dence with it. That’s why so many of us don’t seem to care. We can­not care for what we are not inti­mately involved with, what we don’t inti­mately know. Some talk of this as the “extinc­tion of expe­ri­ence” of the nat­ural envi­ron­ment. Oth­ers sug­gest that many city dwellers, and espe­cially chil­dren, are suf­fer­ing from “nature deficit disorder”.

That’s why we need bio­cul­tural diver­sity. We need to be reminded that we’ve become dis­con­nected, and out of bal­ance with the nat­ural envi­ron­ment. We need to be reminded that there are other ways of being human that are more har­mo­nious with nature. We need to hear the lessons of the many voices of humanity.

Los­ing bio­cul­tural diver­sity means a major weak­en­ing of the whole fab­ric of life—the web of inter­de­pen­dence that is absolutely vital to our com­mon future. It means los­ing our options for life on Earth. It’s like los­ing our life insur­ance when we need it most.

It’s a self-destructive path. And we’re ALL affected, no mat­ter where and how we live. But it’s not too late!

next:  What is Ter­ralin­gua doing about the bio­cul­tural diver­sity cri­sis?»