The cost of damaging Planet Earth
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A recent, two-year study for the United Nations Environment Programme, entitled The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (Teeb), put the damage done to the natural world by human activity in 2008 at between $2tn (£1.3tn) and $4.5tn. The loss of bio-diversity is a key element of this environmental impact.
At the lower estimate, that is roughly equivalent to the entire annual economic output of the UK or Italy.
In the US in 2007, for example, the cost to farmers of a collapse in the number of bees was $15bn, according to the US Department of Agriculture, contributing to a global cost of pollination services of $190bn, according to Teeb. More here from their website.
In 1998, flash flooding in the Yangtze River in China killed more than 4,000 people, displaced millions more and caused damage estimated at $30bn.
Read more here. The Independent also has a superb feature on this issue. Living Planet: The world is not enough
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