Freshwater Fish are Facing a Catastrophic Decline
Image Credit: Shutterstock.com/ francesco de marco
Biodiversity in freshwater ecosystems is under severe threat, with up to one-third of freshwater fish species facing extinction, suggests a WWF report.
A new report from the World Wide Fund (WWF)¹ is a wake-up call to governments worldwide, highlighting that human activities are severely impacting freshwater fish.
The WWF has collaborated with 16 other conservation agencies, including the London Zoological Society (ZSL), Global Wildlife Conservation, and The Nature Conservancy, to produce The World s Forgotten Fishes, a report which suggests that freshwater fish are under threat with up to a third of species facing extinction.
They have fed us for millennia and are critical for the food and nutrition security, livelihoods and cultures of hundreds of millions of people across the globe. But today, nearly a third of freshwater fish species are threatened with extinction.
Feb 23, 2021 12:33 AM EST
They have survived for hundreds of millions of years. Still, according to a recent study reported, many of the world s freshwater megafauna, including sumo-sized stingrays, gigantic catfish, and other freshwater fishes, may soon be on the verge of extinction.
A report warned of a catastrophic collapse in freshwater fish population, with about a third of them threatened with extinction. Conservation organizations said that 80 animals, 16 in the last year alone, were believed to have gone extinct.
(Photo : Mario Tama/Getty Images)
The global extinction in freshwater megafauna, including fish, rodents, amphibians, and mammals, have been quantified for the first time by researchers, and the findings paint a bleak picture. The global stocks of these freshwater giants have decreased by almost 90 percent over four decades since 1970, twice as much as reducing vertebrate populations on land or in the oceans.
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