Marine ecosystems contain many species of animals that regulate ecosystems themselves and affect the overall functioning of our planet. Therefore, threaten these ecosystems and the animals that inhabit them, it means to threaten the existence of the Earth itself.
This is unfortunately what is happening, as reported also in a study of Stanford University researchers. In fact, according to the researchers, the extinction of marine animal species – especially large ones – caused by man, is reaching proportions than ever before.
The research, published in the journal Science, compares the number and size of the species extinct in the last 500 years with those disappeared because of the great mass extinctions that have characterized the history of our planet. The result is that none of these great extinctions has reached the size of the current one, and that none hit large species as it is happening now.
This means that the key is the presence of man, in particular the fishing activities on a large scale at great depths. Until now, human beings were not in possession of such advanced technology, that would allow industrial-scale fishing in the deep sea. For this reason the ecosystems have been spared so far.
Now it is no longer the case and men are exploiting the knowledge brought by technological progress to plunder the oceans without regard to the animal species that live in them.
This type of intensive fishing, if it will be continued in the future, will bring irreversible damage to these delicate ecosystems and will have repercussions on human life. Thus it is necessary to support sustainable fishing.
