Established on May 22, 2000 by the UN General Assembly, World Biodiversity Day was born to commemorate the Convention on Biological Diversity adopted in Nairobi, Kenya, in 1992 and ratified by the States during the Summit of Heads of State at the UN Conference on environment and development, held in Rio de Janero a month later.
This is an international agreement which aims to defend and protect the biological diversity of our planet.
Biodiversity is the biological variety of living organisms, animal and plant species and marine, terrestrial, river and lake ecosystems present in a given environment.
Biological diversity is, in practice, the richness of life on Earth articulated in systems with extremely delicate balances, capable of influencing and regulating the biogeochemical cycles of the planet.
Furthermore, we must not forget that it is the basis of our food, medical, energy and water supply systems, thus constituting an irreplaceable resource for the human species.
For all these reasons, biodiversity is a precious asset to be preserved.
The loss of biodiversity, an increasingly evident emergency in recent years, is due both to natural factors such as fires, floods or eruptions and to anthropogenic threats (i.e. caused by human action) such as destruction and/or fragmentation of entire habitats and ecosystems, the alteration of the life cycles of plants and animals due to pollution, the consumption of soil and the unsustainable over-exploitation of natural resources, the introduction of alien species (species from other ecosystems) invasive, indiscriminate and unregulated hunting and fishing.
World Biodiversity Day is celebrated to remember how important it is to protect the biological variety of living organisms that represent our greatest natural heritage inherited from 3.5 billion years of evolution.