To begin, Dr Mike Rands, Executive Director of Cambridge Conservation Initiative, explains how a partnership of researchers, world-leading conservation practitioners and policy experts has a crucial role to play in this 21st-century challenge.
Life on Earth is at risk from an unprecedented rate of environmental change that threatens the natural resources on which humanity depends. Biodiversity – the genes, species and ecosystems that comprise nature – provides food, fuel, medicines and other vital ‘ecosystem services’, along with countless intangible benefits, for society.
But biodiversity is in steep decline, and its sustainable management is a major challenge for the 21st century. In response, University of Cambridge researchers from diverse disciplines, along with conservation practitioners and policy experts – all linked to global networks – created the Cambridge Conservation Initiative (CCI) in 2007.
Image: Mike Rands Credit: Mark Mniszko
Reproduced courtesy of the University of Cambridge