Trapped on island habitats made smaller by rising seas, Indonesia’s Komodo dragons were on Saturday listed as “endangered,” in an update of the wildlife Red List for Threatened Species that also warned overfishing threatens nearly two in five sharks with extinction.
About 28 percent of the 138,000 species assessed by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) are now at risk of vanishing in the wild forever, as the destructive effects of human activity on the natural world worsen.
The most comprehensive survey of sharks and rays ever undertaken revealed that 37 percent of 1,200 species evaluated are now classified as directly threatened with extinction, falling into one of three categories: “vulnerable,” “endangered” or “critically endangered.”
Photo: AFP
That is one-third more species at risk than only seven years ago, said Nicholas Dulvy, a professor of marine biodiversity and conservation at Simon Fraser University and lead author of a study published on Monday last week underpinning the Red List assessment.
“The conservation status of the group as a whole continues to deteriorate, and overall risk of extinction is rising at an alarming rate,” he said.
However, the latest update of the Red List also highlights the potential for restoration, with four commercially fished tuna species pulling back from a slide toward extinction after a decade of efforts to curb over-exploitation.
The most spectacular recovery was seen in Atlantic bluefin tuna, which leapt from “endangered” across three categories to the safe zone of “least concern.”
The species — a mainstay of high-end sushi in Japan — was last assessed in 2011.
Komodo dragons — the largest living lizards — are found only in the World Heritage-listed Komodo National Park and neighboring Flores island.
The species “is increasingly threatened by the impacts of climate change,” as rising sea levels are expected to shrink its tiny habitat at least 30 percent over the next 45 years, the IUCN said.
“The idea that these prehistoric animals have moved one step closer to extinction due in part to climate change is terrifying,” said Andrew Terry, conservation director at the Zoological Society of London.
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