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An Overview of Freshwater Biodiversity: With Some Lessons from African Fishes
Author(s) -
Stiassny Melanie L. J.
Publication year - 1996
Publication title -
fisheries
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.725
H-Index - 79
eISSN - 1548-8446
pISSN - 0363-2415
DOI - 10.1577/1548-8446(1996)021<0007:aoofb>2.0.co;2
Subject(s) - biodiversity , freshwater ecosystem , wetland , industrialisation , geography , aquatic ecosystem , aquatic biodiversity research , ecology , habitat , agriculture , ecosystem , fishery , environmental resource management , biology , environmental science , political science , law
As the twentieth century draws to a close, arguments about the viability of continued population growth, agricultural development, industrialization, and exhaustive resource use are intensifying. In perhaps no scientific arena are these issues more urgent than in the management of freshwater usage and aquatic conservation. As human populations continue to burgeon, the limits of the Earth's freshwater resources are revealed more and more in the increasingly intense conflicts between human consumptive usage and the maintenance of aquatic health and biodiversity. Despite the fact that freshwater habitats comprise less than one‐hundredth of a percent of the Earth's water, the rivers, lakes, and wetlands of the planet harbor exceptional concentrations of biodiversity. While globally the true degree of aquatic impoverishment is largely unknown, these losses are doubtless already great. Much attention has been focused on worldwide losses of terrestrial biodiversity, particularly in tropical ecosystems, and when considered at all, the situation in freshwaters has tended to be something of an afterthought. However, it is increasingly evident that the pending “crisis of freshwater” will set the agenda regarding future development.