Ecology

Category

World ecology in action

  History of the establishment of IPBES At a meeting on biodiversity and ecosystem services in June 2010, States adopted the Busan outcome document which stated that “an intergovernmental science-policy platform for biodiversity and ecosystem services should be established”. By resolution 65/162 of 20 December 2010, the General Assembly “[took] note of the Busan outcome” and requested the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), “to convene a plenary meeting…to determine modalities and institutional arrangements for [IPBES]”. According to the UN Office of...

Soil is much more than dirt…

Soils underpin our ecosystems, our climate and human culture. Some of the biggest issues affecting our world and its inhabitants have soil at their heart. Healthy soil supports biodiversity: biodiverse soils can host millions of organisms in each teaspoon. Sustaining life in soil is essential to ensure soil health, which supports our ability to grow food and farm effectively. When managed well, soil can store significant amounts of rainfall, preventing flooding and dirty run-off which can affect the health and...

Biomes – where life on Earth lives

What’s a Biome? Here we see two different biomes—deserts on the left and grasslands on the right. But both are land environments. Images by Bob Protus and Bkell. To make sense of complexity, humans often need to categorize, or group, things. We have food groups, sexes, eye colors, ages, and movie genres, to name a few. We categorize all types of things, whether they are ideas or objects, and whether they are small or large. One of the largest things...

Celebrating all things botany

The BSBI is for everyone who is interested in the flora of Britain and Ireland. We trace our origins back to 1836, when the society was founded as the Botanical Society of London. We are now one of the world’s largest contributors of biological records: our data inform scientific research and underpin evidence-based conservation. Find out more about BSBI’s Policy on Nature Conservation. From our earliest days we have welcomed both professional and amateur members: BSBI remains the biggest and...