I.

Description of the human impact on ecosystem

When humans over-hunt key predators such as lions, tigers and bears, they remove the very
animals that keep plant consumers in balance and prevent overgrazing. A healthy ecosystem
has a balance of predators and prey that naturally cycle through life and death sequences. Also,
humans have always cut down trees throughout history. However, they now have the resources
of multimillion-dollar equipment that drastically increases the rate of tree removal. The worlds
rainforests are being destroyed at a rate of 78 million acres per year, resulting in vegetation
degradation, nutrient imbalance, flooding and animal displacement. Trees also act as a natural
air filter in the carbon cycle by taking in carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen, so deforestation
contributes to global warming. Vehicles, trains and planes emit toxic gases that include
carcinogenic particles and irritants, creating air pollution. Humans have also dumped large
amounts of pesticides, such as organophosphates, onto crops that migrate into groundwater
and bodies of water, poisoning ecosystems. Plants and animals die from exposure to pollutants
such as excess nutrients from chemical fertilizers and other harmful chemicals. Joining all these
factors that humans have create its clearly that for more bad than good humans came no harm
the ecosystem and to end with most of the recourses by not taking the adequate care of them.
http://www.skwirk.com/p-c_s-57_u-520_t-1393_c-5363/human-impacts-on-theenvironment/qld/human-impacts-on-the-environment/a-question-of-balance-australianenvironments/civilisation-and-the-ecosystem

Human population growth

Though human population growth may not be a current ecological research priority, it was clear from
the symposium's large attendance that a great deal of interest in the subject exists. Addressing the
standing-room-only crowd were a number of prominent researchers. David Pimentel, a professor at
the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Cornell University, discussed the natural resource
constraints caused by expansion of the human population. Stressing the importance of
interdisciplinary efforts in discovering how to best sustain earth's intricate life support systems was
Gretchen Daily, a research scientist with Stanford University. Donald Ludwig of the Departments of
Mathematics and Zoology at the University of British Columbia assessed the role of economics in
human population growth and consumption. William Rees, also of the University of British Columbia,
introduced the concept of the "ecological footprint," or the amount of land needed to sustain a
population and its consumptive habits, contending that if the current consumption rates of industrial
countries were to spread to lesser developed nations, an area equivalent to two extra planets would
be needed to sustain human life. Joel Cohen, Professor of Populations at the Rockefeller University,
examined the definition of human carrying capacity, emphasizing the role of human choices in
determining how many people the earth can support. By the unmeasured increase of human growth
all the supplies given by the earth will increase too causing an over consuming of the recourses
which leads to the extinction of it.
http://www.esa.org/esa/science/reports/ecological-limits/

Air quality

Each breath we take not only includes oxygen, a gas that we rely on to survive, but also many
harmful gases, heavy metals and other particles such as dust. Air quality of earth is highly
decreasing for so many reasons but the most visible is smog, which generally refers to the air
pollution that is created from the emission of gases such as carbon monoxide (CO), sulphur
oxides (SO2), nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons that come from cars and industrial buildings in
large cities. Carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, is the main pollutant that is warming

Earth. Though living things emit carbon dioxide when they breathe, carbon dioxide is
widely considered to be a pollutant when associated with cars, planes, power plants,
and other human activities that involve the burning of fossil fuels such as gasoline and
natural gas. In the past 150 years, such activities have pumped enough carbon dioxide
into the atmosphere to raise its levels higher than they have been for hundreds of
thousands of years.

http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/global-warming/pollutionoverview/?rptregcta=reg_free_np&rptregcampaign=2015012_invitation_ro_all
http://www.skwirk.com/p-c_s-57_u-520_t-1393_c-5363/human-impacts-on-theenvironment/qld/human-impacts-on-the-environment/a-question-of-balance-australianenvironments/civilisation-and-the-ecosystem

Water quality
Available freshwater resources are emerging as a limiting factor not only in quantity but
also in quality for human development and ecological stability. Nutrient over-enrichment
(eutrophication) is a rapidly growing environmental crisis in freshwater and coastal
ecosystems. Adverse alteration of water quality presently produces large scale illness
and deaths, accounting for approximately 50 million deaths per year worldwide, most of
these deaths occurring in Africa and Asia. In China, for example, about 75 percent of
the population (or 1.1 billion people) are without access to unpolluted drinking water,
according to China's own standards. Widespread consequences of water pollution
upon ecosystems include species mortality, biodiversityreduction and loss
of ecosystem services. Some consider that water pollution may occur from natural
causes such as sedimentation from severe rainfall events; however, natural causes,
including volcanic eruptions and algae blooms from natural causes constitute a minute
amount of the instances of world water pollution. The most problematic of water
pollutants are microbes that induce disease, since their sources may be construed as
natural, but a preponderance of these instances result from human intervention in the
environment or human overpopulation phenomena.
http://www.eoearth.org/view/article/156920/

Panama Case
-List the threats faced by the biodiversity in Panam
-Sand extraction in beaches
-Mining which generates social and ambient instability and contributes to air pollution
-Filling in mangrove in areas around driveways
-Deforestation around all the country for building locals for commerce
-Over fishing which leads to the extinction of marine species
-Unmeasured human growth
-Increasing of urban zones
- Introduction of foreign species has been a factor that has contributed to the
disappearance of native species in certain freshwater bodies in Panam.
http://laestrella.com.pa/economia/mineria-panama-oportunidades-desafios/23813755
-http://www.panamaqmagazine.com/Quicktakes/bio-diversity_spanish.html
https://www.bgeneral.com/Revista/articulos/2004-03/biodiversidad.htm
https://burica.wordpress.com/2007/08/27/estrategia-nacional-de-labiodiversidad-de-panama-marco-conceptual/
http://www.centralamericadata.com/en/article/home/Panama_Sand_Extractio
n_Area_Extended
http://www.centralamericadata.com/en/article/home/Panama_Sand_Extractio
n_Area_Extended