Altogether now ...

Migrating cranes near Straussfurt, Germany. Climate change and biodiversity are “more deeply intertwined than originally thought,” one of the leaders of the new report said.Credit...Jens Meyer/Associated Press

Biodiversity and climate change are two sides of the same coin and both must be addressed simultaneously if we are to save ourselves from a dark future of our own making. Rewild the world as per David Attenborough is the first thing to do now as without the natural world and its inherent link to biodiversity, civilization, as we know it, will be gone in a flash. 

Some environmental solutions are win-win, helping to rein in global warming and protecting biodiversity, too. But others address one crisis at the expense of the other. Growing trees on grasslands, for example, can destroy the plant and animal life of a rich ecosystem, even if the new trees ultimately suck up carbon.

What to do?

Unless the world stops treating climate change and biodiversity collapse as separate issues, neither problem can be addressed effectively, according to a report issued Thursday by researchers from two leading international scientific panels.

Everything's connected including GW and biodiversity

Young mangrove trees on the outskirts of Ziguinchor, the main town in the Casamance region of Senegal. Credit...John Wessels/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

The two groups have operated largely in their own silos. But their subjects are connected by something elemental, literally: carbon itself.

The same element that makes up heat-trapping carbon dioxide, methane and soot is also a fundamental building block of the natural world. It helps form the very tissue of plants and animals on earth. It’s stored in forests, wetlands, grasslands and on the ocean floor. In fact, land and water ecosystems are already stashing away half of human-generated emissions.

Another connection between climate and biodiversity: People have created emergencies on both fronts by using the planet’s resources in unsustainable ways.

Time to shape up, right?