Celebrating the International Day for Biodiversity

On May 21st the UNU-LRT fellows participated in a tree-planting event to celebrate the International Day for Biodiversity.  This event was a part of the Green Wave Youth Education, an international campaign to educate the youth about biodiversity.  The fellows joined Icelandic school children in planting native trees, helped by the minister for the Environment, Svandís Svavardóttir, and the former president of Iceland, Vigdís Finnbogadóttir.

2010 has been declared the International Year of Biodiversity by the United Nations as you can read about here http://www.cbd.int/2010/welcome/.  You can find more information about the Green wave on their webpage at http://greenwave.cbd.int/en/home.

Biodiversity is a global issue that is important to fight locally by promoting local species and nursing ecosystems.  Biodiversity is correlated with various ecosystem services, some that protect water resources, others that enhance soils formation and protection, nutrient storage and recycling, pollution breakdown and absorption.  Biodiversity increases resilience and resistance in ecosystems exposed to various disturbances.  Biodiversity is also important to maintain as that protects our food resources, resources for medicinal and pharmaceutical drugs, both today and as future resources.  Promoting and preserving biodiversity is hence strongly related to the general objectives of the UNU-LRT programme.

The UNU-LRT fellows are all well aware of the importance of biodiversity from their home countries and were delighted to participate, not to mention to meet our former president, Vigdís.