The Conservation International organisation supports a concept coined by environmentalist Norman Myers called ‘Biodiversity Hotspots’ and it refers to certain selected wild places around the world. Our Himalayan region, including Uttarakhand, is a Biodiversity Hotspot too. But what exactly does this hot new term mean?
Basically, to fall in this hotspot category, the place must fulfill two criteria. The first one is that it needs to have a very high level of biodiversity, or in simple terms, a high count of unique species of flora and fauna need to be present. Ideally, these species of plants and animals should be endemic to the area, i.e., they are not found in any other part of the world and hence have a geographic concentration risk. The second condition to be met is that the hotspot should have had a habitat loss of at least 70% from its original size, oftentimes due to human activities such as agriculture and urbanisation causing deforestation. When you put these two criteria together, you realise the gravity of what it means to be in the Biodiversity Hotspot list and why it’s so crucial to protect such a biome.
There is a total of 36 such hotspots around the world and 4 of them are in India. And while these habitats’ collective current area makes up only 2.5% of the Earth’s terrestrial surface, they house around half of the world’s endemic species of plants, birds, mammals, reptiles and amphibians. Some of the major biodiversity hotspots where not just 70% but over 90% of the habitat is already lost are the Caribbean Islands in North America; Brazil’s Atlantic Rainforest in South America; the Horn of Africa, Afro-Montane Forests of Congo, Coastal Forests of East Africa and the Madagascar Islands in Africa; the Mediterranean Basin in Southern Europe and the Mountains of South-West China, Philippines Islands, Sundaland (includes Borneo, Sumatra, Andamans, etc.) and the Indo-Burma region in Asia.
Earlier, our Himalayan Hotspot was considered as part of the Indo-Burma region but was subsequently separated and given its own space in this ‘hot’ list. Now, the Uttarakhand Himalayas are part of this hot list. On the one hand, it is a matter of joy that we have such high levels of plant and animal biodiversity within our biomes. On the other hand, it is extremely sad, since 75% of our habitat has been lost in recent times and a very high percentage of species here (mostly endemic) are at risk of being wiped out from Uttarakhand and possibly the Earth itself.
So, are we to, one day, forever lose our endangered species in Uttarakhand like the Himalayan Thar, Himalayan Musk Deer, the iconic Snow Leopard (aka the ghost cat), the Himalayan Quail, our various vultures and even our many endangered plant species? Well, there are no easy answers here and that’s why we must ask the question.
