'To see the eastern gorilla – one
of our closest cousins – slide towards extinction is truly distressing'
Ian
Johnston Environment Correspondent
The largest primate on Earth –
the eastern gorilla – is now “critically endangered”, it
has been officially announced after a staggering decline in their population in
just 20 years. The decision by the International Union for
Conservation of Nature(IUCN) means that four out of the six great
apes – both types of gorilla and both types of orangutan – are feared to be on
the brink of extinction.
It would perhaps not be
surprising if they were to die out. Of more than 82,000 species assessed by the
IUCN, nearly 30 per cent are facing that fate – almost entirely because of the
actions of humans.
Geologists are currently
considering reclassifying the Earth’s present geological epoch as the
Anthropocene – a name that reflects the extent of our
impact on the planet – partly because of what some scientists are already
calling the sixth
mass extinction of life on Earth. If they are correct, it is
a slaughter comparable to the disappearance of the dinosaurs 66 million years
ago, when a massive asteroid is thought to have hit what is now Mexico, sending
a blanket of thick smoke around the Earth.
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