How Biodiversity Loss and Climate Change Are Impacting Children’s Health

December 29, 2024 / activist360

Group of children lying in a circle on a carpeted floor, smiling and laughing while looking up at the camera. The photo is framed with a colorful, crayon-like border featuring flowers, hearts, and tulips in vibrant colors like red, orange, pink, green, and yellow. The playful and cheerful design complements the joyful expressions of the children, creating a warm and lively atmosphere.

Joyful Moments in Full Bloom

A Call to Action

The health of our planet and our children are closely linked. Biodiversity—the variety of life on Earth—plays a critical role in keeping ecosystems and people healthy. Yet, biodiversity is rapidly declining, and climate change is worsening its impacts. Children are particularly vulnerable to these changes, as their developing bodies are more sensitive to environmental stressors and they face a longer lifetime of exposure.

Understanding the Crisis

What Is Biodiversity and Why Does It Matter?

Biodiversity refers to the variety of plants, animals, and microorganisms on Earth, as well as the ecosystems they form. It ensures clean air, water, and food, regulates diseases, and supports human health in countless ways.

However, human activity—deforestation, pollution, and overuse of natural resources—has caused biodiversity to decline at an alarming rate. Combined with climate change, these losses create a cycle of destruction that threatens not just the environment, but also our health.

Why Are Children More Vulnerable?

The impacts of biodiversity loss and climate change are particularly severe for children due to their unique vulnerabilities. These include biological factors and social dependencies that make them less able to cope with environmental changes. For example:

Their immune, respiratory, and nervous systems are still developing.
They breathe more air and consume more food relative to their size, increasing exposure to pollutants.
They depend on adults to provide safe environments and resources.

Key Areas of Impact on Pediatric Health

Microbial Diversity: Building Immunity

Microbial diversity, found in soil, water, and plants, is essential for the healthy development of a child’s immune system. When ecosystems lose biodiversity, children lose exposure to beneficial microbes, leading to a range of health issues.

What It Does: Microbial diversity in soil, water, and plants influences the microbes children are exposed to, which is essential for developing strong immune systems.
The Problem: Biodiversity loss reduces exposure to beneficial microbes, increasing risks of allergies, asthma, and inflammatory diseases.

Green Spaces: Nature’s Healing Power

Green spaces with diverse plant and animal life provide much more than aesthetic beauty. They are critical for children’s mental, emotional, and physical health, offering restorative environments for growth and learning.

Benefits: Access to biodiverse green spaces improves physical activity, mental health, and cognitive development in children.
Evidence: Studies show that exposure to diverse plant and animal life in parks and gardens boosts children’s emotional well-being and attention spans.

Heatwaves and Flooding: Rising Risks

As climate change drives more extreme weather, children are facing increasing risks from heatwaves and flooding. These events not only cause immediate health threats but also disrupt the ecosystems that help protect against them.

Heat-Related Illnesses: Children are at greater risk of heat exhaustion and dehydration during heatwaves, which are becoming more frequent due to climate change.
Flooding: Loss of ecosystems like wetlands, which absorb excess water, increases the risks of displacement, injury, and waterborne diseases.

Infectious Diseases: Expanding Threats

Climate change is enabling the spread of disease-carrying insects to new regions, putting children at a greater risk of infectious diseases. Biodiversity loss compounds this by reducing natural pest control systems.

Vector-Borne Diseases: Climate change allows disease-carrying insects like mosquitoes to thrive in new regions, increasing risks of illnesses like dengue and Lyme disease.
Children at Risk: With weaker immune systems, children are more susceptible to severe outcomes.

Air Pollution: Breathing Problems

The destruction of biodiversity-rich ecosystems contributes to worsening air pollution. For children, this means a higher risk of respiratory illnesses and developmental challenges.

The Link: Biodiversity loss contributes to air pollution as ecosystems that filter air—like forests—are destroyed.
Impact: Air pollution worsens asthma, bronchitis, and developmental issues in children.

Pediatric Medicine: Lost Potential

Biodiversity plays a key role in medical advancements. Many life-saving medicines have been discovered through the study of plants, animals, and microorganisms, a potential that is at risk with biodiversity loss.

Biodiversity’s Role: Many medicines are derived from plants, animals, and microorganisms. For example, antibiotics like penicillin come from fungi.
The Risk: Biodiversity loss could mean less availability of these medicinal sources.

Solutions and Mitigation Strategies

Ecosystem Restoration

Restoring biodiversity is critical for mitigating the impacts of climate change and creating healthier environments for children. These efforts can range from local projects like community gardens to global initiatives aimed at protecting ecosystems.

What Works: Rewilding efforts and urban planning that integrate biodiversity can restore ecosystems and improve air quality, reduce flooding, and create cooling effects.
Example: Restored urban green spaces have been shown to lower temperatures and improve local health outcomes.

Engaging Children in Biodiversity Initiatives

Getting children involved in biodiversity restoration not only helps ecosystems but also benefits their mental health and emotional well-being. These programs foster a sense of agency and environmental awareness.

Programs: Community gardens, tree-planting drives, and biodiversity education in schools.
Benefits: These activities not only improve ecosystems but also enhance children’s mental health, provide hands-on learning, and empower them to take action.

Policy and Community Action

Addressing biodiversity loss requires a collaborative effort across individuals, communities, and governments. Policymakers and organizations can create programs that protect and restore biodiversity while involving the public.

Global Initiatives: The UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration is an example of efforts to promote biodiversity worldwide.
Local Efforts: Schools and communities can push for greener policies, like protecting wetlands or creating more biodiverse parks.

Research Gaps and Future Directions

While we know biodiversity loss and climate change harm children’s health, more research is needed to fully understand the long-term effects. By addressing these gaps, we can create better solutions tailored to children’s needs.

More studies are needed on the long-term health benefits of biodiversity restoration.
Research should focus on how interventions, especially in underserved communities, can best support children.

Summing Up

Biodiversity and climate change are not abstract issues—they directly impact children’s health today and their futures tomorrow. From the air they breathe to the spaces they play in, children are deeply connected to the natural world. Protecting biodiversity results in safeguarding the well-being of the next generation.

Call to Action

We can restore biodiversity by planting native species, reducing waste, and supporting conservation organizations. Communities can demand greener policies, and governments must prioritize ecosystem restoration. Together, we can protect our planet and ensure a healthier, safer future for all children.

Source: Seastedt, H., Schuetz, J., Perkins, A., Gamble, M., & Sinkkonen, A. (2024). Impact of urban biodiversity and climate change on children’s health and well-being. Pediatric Research.

Framing up the community-centred future of peatland management

February 12, 2023 / activist360

*Women in Perigi Village, South Sumatra, routinely harvest Purun to make plaited mats. Photo by Rifky/CIFOR*

Experts share knowledge from long-term research in Indonesia and beyond

By Nabiha Shahab, Forests News (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)

Indonesia has the third-largest area of biodiversity-rich tropical forests in the world. The archipelago is considered one of the world’s 17 ‘megadiverse’ countries and houses two of the 25 global biodiversity ‘hotspots’. In 2015, however, the country experienced its worst forest fire disaster in almost two decades. In September and October that year, carbon emissions released by the fires reached 11.3 million tons per day – higher than the emissions of the entire European Union, which released 8.9 million tons daily over the same period.

In response to the disaster – and as part of wider efforts to restore 14 million hectares of degraded land, including two million hectares of peatlands – the Korean and Indonesian governments have developed a peatland restoration project which focuses on the ‘3Rs’: rewetting, revegetation, and revitalization. Activities include rewetting infrastructure, revegetating over 200 hectares with tree planting, and land revitalization in 10 villages surrounding the project site, as well as the creation of a small peatland education center.

“We believe that this peatland restoration project will help create a sustainable ecosystem and have a productive impact on the community,” said Junkyu Cho, Korean Co-Director of the Korea-Indonesia Forest Cooperation Center (KIFC), during a symposium to share knowledge and experience gained from peatland restoration initiatives in several locations across Indonesia, on 7 December 2022 at CIFOR’s Bogor campus. The international symposium also aimed to enhance the network of researchers involved in peatland restoration and governance.

The research team, which hails from Korea’s National Institute of Forest Science (NIFoS) and the Center for International Forestry Research and World Agroforestry (CIFOR-ICRAF), will develop a model for restoring peatlands and other degraded lands in Indonesia in ways that make the most of science and technology and improve local livelihoods.

“We hope that various issues, such as climate change adaptation, nature-based solutions, and bio-economy will be explored under the rubric of peatlands,” said Hyungsoon Choi, the director of NIFoS’ Global Forestry Research Division. The researchers are also helping to develop sustainable community-based reforestation and enterprises, said CIFOR-ICRAF Senior Scientist Himlal Baral.

During the symposium, Baral also shared information on CIFOR-ICRAF’s long-term Sustainable Community-based Reforestation and Enterprises (SCORE) project, which runs for the same period as the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration and provides valuable opportunities for research. The study involves identifying areas for restoration, and for planting sustainable timber and non-timber forest products. “We start with small demonstration trials, and we hope to scale up and achieve long-term impacts,” he said, adding that smart agroforestry is one of the options for restoration.

Nisa Novita, from local NGO Yayasan Konservasi Alam Nusantara (YKAN), shared some of her research into the mitigation potential of natural climate solutions for Indonesia. Her team found that the country offers a dramatic opportunity to contribute to tackling climate change by increasing carbon sequestration and storage through the protection, improved management, and restoration of drylands, peatlands, and mangrove ecosystems. “Protecting, managing, and restoring Indonesia’s wetlands is key to achieving the country’s emissions reduction target by 2030,” she said.

Several presenters shared models for cost-effective restoration. A-Ram Yang of NIFoS’ Global Forestry Division discussed a visit to the Perigi peatland landscape in South Sumatra in September 2022. Meanwhile, a team from Korea’s Kookmin University shared their experience assessing ecosystem services in North Korea’s forests with a view to adapting these for use in Indonesia.

Budi Leksono, a senior researcher at the Research Center for Plant Conservation and the Forestry, National Research, and Innovation Agency (BRIN), spoke of the potential of genetic improvement to serve restoration goals. “The use of improved seeds for plantation forests has been proven to increase the productivity and quality of forest products,” he said. “In accordance with the goal of restoration in Indonesia to restore trees and forests to degraded forest landscapes on a large scale, it should also be applied to the landscape restoration program to increase the added value of the land, and will have an impact on increasing ecological resilience and productivity.”

On a similar note, in a research collaboration with CIFOR-ICRAF, scientists at Sriwijaya University (UNSRI) developed a model for landscape restoration to be applied to wide range of species of high economic value, including Jelutung (Dyera costulata), Belangeran (Shorea balangeran), Nyamplung (Calophyllum inophyllum) and Malapari (Pongamia pinnata). One of the scientists, Agus Suwignyo, said that “the use of improved seeds for landscape restoration will have an impact on people’s welfare if this is also followed by implementing a planting pattern that is in accordance with the conditions of the land and the needs of the local community.”

Participating farmers also chose their own preferred species, such as jackfruit (Artocarpus heterophyllus), avocado (Persea americana), mango (Mangifera indica), nangkadak (a hybrid of Artocarpus heterophillus and Artocarpus integer), sapodilla (Manilkara zapota), oranges (Citrus sp.), soursop (Annona muricata), rambutan (Nephelium lappaceum) and betel or areca palm (Areca catechu). From 2018 to 2020, UNSRI helped local farmers to develop smart agrosilvofishery, improved rice cultivation, introduce other economical rice crops, plant trees, and cultivate various local fish species.

The method showed positive results. “During the long dry season in 2018, the surrounding area was burned by other farmers, but our demo plot area was not burned,” said Suwignyo. “This year, we scaled up the area to 10 hectares.” The story echoed a common theme within the symposium: the importance of well-planned, multidisciplinary, evidence-based restoration that puts both people and nature first.

This research was supported by the National Institute of Forest Science, Republic of Korea and collaborated with National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN), Republic of Indonesia ; Tropical Rainforest Reforestation Center of Mulawarman University; University of Muhammadiyah Palangkaraya; Center of Excellence for Peatland Research at Sriwijaya University.

Scientists are Reproducing Coral in Labs to Save Them. This is How it Works

August 24, 2020 / activist360 / Leave a comment

*Soft corals, algae, fish ( a doctorfish and butterflyfish), and sponges in a highly diverse reef scene. Photo by NOAA on Unsplash.*

By Jenny Mallon, PhD Candidate in Coral Reef Biogeochemistry, University of Glasgow, World Economic Forum published in collaboration with The Conversation (Public License).

Coral reefs are important natural ecosystems but are at risk from a variety of factors, including climate change.
Marine biologists are helping corals to reproduce in restoration projects.
Understanding successful reproduction could be the key to coral reefs’ survival.

Coral reefs host a quarter of all sea species, but climate change, overfishing, and pollution could drive these ecosystems to extinction within a matter of decades.

Marine biologists have been racing to restore degraded reefs by collecting corals from the wild and breaking them into fragments. This encourages them to grow fast and quickly produces hundreds of smaller corals which can be raised in nurseries and eventually transplanted back onto the reef.

But if each fragment is an identical copy with one common parent, any resulting colony is likely to be genetically identical to the rest of the population. This matters – having a diverse range of genetically conferred traits can help insure reefs against disease and a rapidly changing environment.

So what if scientists could use sexual reproduction in coral restoration projects? In the wild, the stony coral species that compose the bulk of the world’s tropical reefs cast their sperm and eggs into the water column to reproduce. Corals often synchronise these mass spawning events with full moons, when tides are exceptionally high. This ensures powerful water currents disperse the eggs far and wide, so that they’re fertilised by sperm of distant colonies.

*Corals often broadcast reproductive material during the full moon, to take advantage of powerful water currents. Image: Jenny Mallon, Author provided.*

Sexually produced offspring have a unique combination of genes from distinct parents, and this helps keep coral populations genetically diverse. Reefs restored with corals created by sexual reproduction are likely to be more resilient, though managing this process hasn’t been easy for scientists to do. But by working on one project in Mexico, I saw what is possible, and learned how to do it myself.

Coral Sex in the Lab

Coral reefs are so enormous they’re visible from space. But watching them spawn is surprisingly tricky. They only do it on a handful of nights each year and the exact date and time is determined by environmental factors that scientists are still working to fully understand.

Climate change is causing reefs with known spawning patterns to shift their timing too, making these events less frequent and predictable. This makes it difficult for different colonies to synchronise spawning, reducing their chances of successful fertilisation in the wild.

The CORALIUM Laboratory of the National Autonomous University of Mexico is part of a Caribbean-wide network of dedicated coral spawning experts. Scientists here collect coral sperm and eggs from multiple Caribbean reefs in order to fertilise them in the lab.

The team wait for the full moon to signal when corals are likely to spawn. Coral sperm and eggs are collected with floating nets and plastic containers, and divers take extreme care to avoid damaging the reef. The millions of sperm and eggs collected are rushed back to the lab where they’re cleaned and monitored all night as they undergo assisted fertilisation to begin life as free swimming larvae. These larvae are very sensitive to water quality, temperature and pathogens, so they need constant care.

Eventually, the larvae settle on hard surfaces where they change into polyps – the initial building blocks of a coral colony. In the ocean, these surfaces are often dead coral skeletons. In the lab, they are seeding units – 3-D shapes designed by scientists at the conservation organisation SECORE to resemble coral rubble that can float on ocean currents before resting on reefs.

*Seeding units mimic coral rubble that floats on ocean currents. Image: SECORE International/Amanda Baye, Author provided.*

Each juvenile produced this way carries a unique mix of genes which they will pass on to a new generation of corals. The resulting population has a stronger gene pool that can help it withstand new diseases and other threats. This long-term strategy also ensures sexual reproduction can continue on restored reefs, which would not be possible for a population composed of identical clones.

Restoring Caribbean Reefs

The Caribbean may have lost as much as 80% of its coral cover since the mid-1970s. The colonies that remain are now relatively isolated, reducing the chances of them being able to crossbreed. But in the controlled conditions of the lab, fertilisation rates of over 80% are common and larval survival is high. That means thousands of juvenile corals are reared until they’re ready for the reef after just a few weeks of incubation.

But with late night dives by experts, specialised materials for collecting spawn and a lab where fertilisation is carefully controlled, this work is often too expensive for smaller restoration projects. So scientists here have developed low-cost methods for lab spawning and are training teams from across the Caribbean to do it.

I took their course in 2016, and one year later, found myself setting up a new spawning site in Akumal, one hour south of the CORALIUM lab near Cancun. Coral spawning had never been observed here, but I trained volunteers from a local dive centre on how to spot the signs. On our fifth consecutive night dive, we saw the synchronised spawning of multiple colonies of Elkorn corals.

We set up a hotel room as a temporary lab with sterilised plastic larvae tanks and filtered seawater and produced thousands of coral babies for restoration sites. In 2018, we built a beachside coral spawning laboratory on a shoestring budget. Positioned under a tree, the breeze block structure has mosquito netting walls that allow the cool sea breeze to keep the tanks at a constant 28-29°C.

*Scientists are using laboratories for coral spawning, to ensure survival. Image: Jenny Mallon, Author provided.*

The lab was just about up and running in time for that year’s lunar eclipse. We hadn’t anticipated a mass spawn of so many colonies, so the lab inauguration was a chaos of colour coded collection cups from different sites and parent colonies.

Running a coral spawning site has been the most rewarding experience of my career so far. It is everything that research should be: cutting edge, dynamic and challenging. It’s what I signed up for when I became a marine scientist.