A United Nations (UN)-supported study underscored the need for concerted efforts to address the loss of biodiversity that include sustainability in investments and global biodiversity monitoring.

This came to fore as the study indicated a continuous global biodiversity loss to save the environment, one of the eight- point agenda of the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)’s World Conservation Monitoring Center and Bird Life International revealed that global biodiversity continues to decline despite a pledge by world leaders in 2002 to curb biodiversity loss.

“Our analysis shows that governments have failed to deliver on the commitments they made in 2002: Biodiversity is still being lost as fast as ever, and we have made little headway in reducing the pressures on species, habitats and ecosystems,” Stuart Butchart, lead author of the study, said.

Under the MDG blueprint, environment sustainability is expected to be achieved by 2015.

Butchart noted that “although nations have put in place some significant policies to slow biodiversity declines, these have been woefully inadequate, and the gap between the pressures on biodiversity and the responses is getting ever wider.”

Base on more than 30 indicators such as measures of different aspects of biodiversity, including changes in species’ populations and risk of extinction, habitat extent and community composition, the study found no evidence of a significant reduction in the rate of decline of biodiversity.

“Since 1970, we have reduced animal populations by 30 percent, the area of mangroves and sea grasses by 20 percent and the coverage of living corals by 40 percent,” UNEP chief scientist Joseph Alcamo, on the other hand, said.

“These losses are clearly unsustainable, since biodiversity makes a key contribution to human well-being and sustainable development, as recognized by the UN Millennium Development Goals,” Alcamo pointed out.

It will be recalled that the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific Statistical Yearbook for Asia Pacific 2009 released in April this year revealed that the Asia Pacific region has the highest number of threatened species, with almost one-third of all threatened plants, and over one third of all threatened animal species. Southeast Asia contains the most countries with species under threat.

The Southeast Asia region alone has three mega-diverse countries, including the Philippines. The other two are Malaysia and Indonesia.

The region likewise has four countries identified as biodiversity hot spots, including the Philippines.