W4: Earth's Ecosystem's Future

Present situation:

    What is ecosystem? An ecosystem is defined as a geographic area where plants, animals and other organisms, as well as weather and landscape, work together to form a bubble of life. There are two factors in an ecosystem, biotic and abiotic factors, which means living and non-living factors respectively. Biotic factors include animals, plants and other living organisms while abiotic factors includes temperature, weather and the landscape. Since every part of an ecosystem is linked in one way or another, a small change in a part can cause a huge butterfly effect that can ripple through the whole ecosystem. Therefore, it is very important to make sure that the ecosystems are maintained at a balanced state or it will go out of control. In the present day, many ecosystems on Earth are facing challenges and their health and stability are in danger. For example, the ecosystems in the Amazon rainforest are facing challenges due to human factors such as deforestation, climate change and air pollution. Should the ecosystem become unstable, the organisms in the ecosystem will die and some species may even go extinct. Other than that, the population of some species may blow up figuratively and causes even more serious issues. Moreover, global warming is also a serious issue which stems from industrial activities and the deteriorating ecosystem.

 

Future vision:

    Extrapolating the condition of the ecosystem’s current situation and trends, the future for Earth’s ecosystem will be significantly worse. In the future, there will be barely any forests left due to deforestation and global warming, causing many areas of the Earth to not be suitable for trees to grow in. Due to this, many species of animals will become endangered or even go extinct. Moreover, many animals would not have a place to call home and some areas on Earth may not even be suitable for humans to live in. Other than that, the sea level will rise significantly due to global warming causing the icecaps to melt, causing the shrinkage of land mass.

 

 Creative solutions:

In order to avoid a bad future for the Earth, these are the few creative solution that can be utilized:

1.      1. A subject where the sciences regarding the sustainability of the Earth is taught to kids

This subject allows students to learn about the ecosystem, the impacts of their daily activities towards the Earth and et cetera. This allows the kids to be more mindful about their actions and think about the actions that will harm the Earth in the present and the future they will be living in. This causes them to be able to grow up into people that are more environmentally conscious, making them less likely to support activities that destroy the ecosystem. This subject should be mandated by the government to instil eco-friendly awareness among the future generations.

 

2.      2. Community service that targets environmental issues

The community should create an event where the people of an area can gather up to do activities such as cleaning the beach, planting trees and recycling. This allows the community to engage in activities that are able to help the environment and ecosystem in a positive way. It also allow kids to develop interest in involving in endeavours that helps the ecosystem and the environment. These events should also be heavily supported by the local communities and the government. With the effort from the people, the ecosystem definitely has a chance to be improved.

 

3.      3. Renewable energy should be the main source of energy

Renewable energy should be the primary source of energy because it does not release pollutants such as carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide which are leading causes in the deterioration of ecosystems and global warming. Moreover, people should also be more accepting to switching to electric vehicles as they are much more efficient and does not use fossil fuel that are harmful. The shift to electric vehicles can be done by the government imposing more tax on fossil fuel or even subsidising the purchase of electric vehicles.

 

Reflection:

    In retrospect, this blog was inspired by the movie "WALL-E" where the Earth has no more ecosystem and was abandoned after humans decided to leave Earth. The solutions that I came up with in this blog are inspired from articles on the Internet and documentary TV shows about the ecosystem of the Earth. After researching for this blog, I have found out that the Earth faces a dangerous future if humans does not take action to amend upon the problems we are causing towards the Earth.