An published this past week in Science urges Congress to fund conservation laws at the level needed to recover endangered species, a standard the U.S. government currently fails to meet. The letter, written by researchers at the nonprofit Defenders of Wildlife and co-signed by 1,648 scientists and counting, stresses that the ongoing biodiversity crisis, in which an estimated 1 million species globally are at risk of extinction, must be addressed to save wildlife and avoid harm to human societies.
鈥淭he U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) is widely considered the strongest law in the world for conserving imperiled wildlife,鈥 the letter reads. 鈥淗owever, decades of severe underfunding have prevented the ESA from achieving its potential.鈥
An analysis completed by the Washington, D.C.-based Defenders earlier this year found that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), the agency primarily responsible for enforcing the 1973 law, needs an annual ESA budget of $486 million to adequately prevent endangered and threatened U.S. wildlife species鈥攊ncluding 112 birds such as Piping Plover, California Condor, and Golden-cheeked Warbler鈥攆rom slipping into extinction. Congress currently supplies less than half that amount to the agency for ESA programs, the letter says.
鈥淭he endangered species list gets longer, but the funds don鈥檛 get any commensurate increase,鈥 says conservation biologist Thomas Lovejoy, a senior fellow at the UN Foundation and letter co-signer.
A cited in the letter found that only 12 percent of listed U.S. species receive as much or greater funding than laid out in their recovery plan. As a result, the letter says, more than half of listed species are not moving toward recovery; their populations are merely maintaining or even declining.
The letter also underscores that conservation laws work only if they鈥檙e given adequate financial support for enforcement. 鈥淚t takes effort and resources to restore habitat that has been degraded, and to provide the kind of places species need to survive,鈥 says Sarah Greenberger, the senior vice president of conservation policy for the 约炮视频, who did not sign the letter but "applauds" it. 鈥淥n all fronts, we鈥檙e not taking the steps we need to take if we want to keep the wildlife we value thriving.鈥
Published on September 20, the letter was written by Jacob Malcolm, the director of Defenders of Wildlife鈥檚 Center for Conservation Innovation, along with policy analyst Megan Evansen and senior scientist Jennifer Miller. The plea comes as Congress approaches its annual budget-appropriations season, when it decides how to dole out taxpayer money to agencies and programs, including FWS. The team wrote the letter and then circulated it in the conservation community for approximately one month, from scientists around the country and world by the time of its publication.
Fully funding the ESA isn't the only request in the letter. 鈥淎s scientists, we call on the U.S. Congress to fully fund wildlife conservation programs to protect biodiversity from severe and growing threats,鈥 the letter says. Right now, Congress is weighing several such bills, Malcolm says, including the Recovering America鈥檚 Wildlife Act, sponsored by Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-MI), which would allocate $1.3 billion every year to states, territories, and tribes to fund their wildlife conservation programs. Last week, Rep. Jared Huffman (D-CA) and Rep. Vern Buchanan (R-MI) to provide aid to overseas conservation organizations working to save critically imperiled species. And earlier this year, Rep. Ra煤l Grijalva (D-AZ) that would provide funding for four overlooked vulnerable groups: butterflies, Hawaiian plants, eastern freshwater mussels, and southwest desert fish.
鈥淭he letter鈥檚 timing coincides with other efforts to increase funding for threatened and endangered species,鈥 Malcolm says. If these efforts are successful, he hopes the money will help those species most in need. 鈥淚f we鈥檙e going to put forth a whole bunch of money, let鈥檚 make sure that the species closest to the edge of extinction actually are sufficiently funded,鈥 he says.
According to the recent Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services Global Assessment, Earth is facing a in which up to 1 million plant and animal species risk extinction; the assessment's key message is that 鈥渘ature and its vital contributions to people, which together embody biodiversity and ecosystem functions and services, are deteriorating worldwide.鈥
In response to these alarming findings, the scientists close their letter by urging 鈥渋mmediate action鈥 on conservation funding 鈥渢o protect our national heritage and safeguard human well-being."
鈥淲hile there is a crisis, we also have solutions,鈥 Malcolm says. 鈥淲e do actually know what needs to happen. We have great laws on the books in the United States for endangered and threatened species. Where the gap is, is actually providing the funding to use those tools.鈥