extinction

"The clock to extinction is ticking faster than it was a decade ago."
-Dr. Josa C. Depre

Hello everyone, today I want to tell you about one of the most serious problems in this world: extinction. With this speech I am going to show you the power behind this simple word and I hope that after you have listened to my speech, you will think twice about pulling out a plant or killing an insect just because you do not like them. Because you never know exactly if they could be the last of their species.

So right now, there are about two million animal species with nearly one million specific animals. Yes, one million animals! But let us travel back in time into the year 1970. In this time, 58% more animals lived on this planet. This is unbelievable! Within only 40 years, the amount of animals dropped by 58%. Can you imagine that? Animal and plant species die 100 times faster than they should and that is way too fast! Now, guess who is to blame for that? Right, it is our own fault! It is the fault of humanity! Because we are the ones fishing the sees empty, polluting the environment and clearing the forests. We are the ones destroying habitats of animals and plants, like the rain forest. We are the ones heating up the climate change, killing many animals and plants because they can not stand those temperature differences. We are to blame for that! Even the nature is a killer too by its volcanic eruptions, hurricanes or tsunamis, it is still our fault that the last animals of their species extinct because we did nothing to save them or tried to save them too late. The perfect example for it is the story of the St. Helena olive. Many of this beautiful plant died because of deforestation and the rest of it died because of a fungal infection. And when there was only a single plant left, some people tried to protect it. Unfortunately without any success. In 2003, the last St. Helena olive died. But I have got another story for you, which seems to be even more heart breaking. This story is about the Tasmanian wolf. I guess that most of you have already heard about him. This animal got wiped out by mankind because they thought that the Tasmanian wolf would kill their sheeps. Later, when the species of the Tasmanian wolf had already died out, scientists found out that the real sheep killers were the dogs from European tourists and immigrants. The last Tasmanian wolf died in 1936. Paul R. Ehrlich once told: "In pushing other species to extinction, humanity is busy sawing off the limb on which it perches.". And he is absolutely right. Just take the example of deforestation. By that, some plant species die because of the clearings and some animal species became extinct because they have no other place to live or because their food disappeared. But we do need those forests! We need them for clean air, we need them to live! So you see that the extinction of animals, plants and our own lifes are closely linked. As I told, there are two million animal species and nearly 391 thousand plant species in this world. But about 425 thousand species of them are endangered. But we can do something about it. Yes, we can! There are such easy ways to help animals and plants, that every single person of you could do. The easiest way to help is simply by using a bicycle or to walk as often as possible to make sure that no toxic gases from your cars get spread into the air and count possibly make animals sick or strengthen the greenhouse effect which is slowly killing animals, plants and even us. You can also help by purchasing bio products or products with a seal or label, like the MSC label to make sure that no animals will die for the production of this product. I know that it is expensive, but it also helps saving precious lifes. And if you really want to promote helping animal and plant species, I am recommending you to donate to organisations like WWF or Greenpeace to help dropping the extinction rate.

I guess we all came to the conclusion that we, the human race, are the main reason for extinction. So it is up to us, to help and to do something about it! And I know that we can not stop extinction because that is just a part of evolution. But we can, at least, drop the number of extincted animals and plants to save their and even our own life. Just think about your future! You can not live without a single tree or without a single animal on this planet. So we all should care and start to help! Because every single animal and plant has the same right to live on this planet as you and me.
Thank you.