Differentiate between in brief about direct and indirect use of biodiversity with suitable examples.
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Biological Diversity - The Spice of Life
By Wisdom Dlamini - Swaziland National Trust Commission
It is often said that variety is a spice of life. No intelligent investor confines his money to one or two shares. No one can sit stably and comfortably on a chair with two legs, No one remains fully healthy on a restricted diet. These facts are obvious, but the larger analogy that a varied base is vital for human existence fails to achieve recognition. The variety of living things around us is one of the greatest wonders of life on earth. This is the reason why our ancestors were able to survive without industries, without the latest technologies, without the guns, without the bulldozers and so forth. This clearly shows that the human race has been dependent on the natural world ever since its existence on this planet.
Most of our country’s greatest wealth is contained in natural forests, plains, mountains, wetlands and marine habitats. These biological resources are the physical manifestation of the globe’s biological diversity, which simply stated is the variety and variability among living organisms and the ecological complexes in which they occur. Effective systems of management can ensure that biological resources not only survive, but in fact increase while they are being used, thus providing the foundation for sustainable development and for stable national economies. But instead of conserving the rich resources of forest, wetland, and sea, current processes of development in the country are depleting many biological resources at such a rate that they are rendered essentially non-renewable. Conservation of living natural resources - plants, animals and micro-organisms, and the non-living elements of the environment on which they depend - is crucial for sustainable development. Species and their genetic materials promise to play an expanding role in development, and a powerful economic rationale is emerging to bolster the ethical, aesthetic, and scientific cases for preserving them. The genetic variability and germ-plasm material of species make contributions to agriculture, medicine, and industry worth many billion of dollars per year. If nations can ensure the survival of species, the world can look forward to new drugs and medicines, and new raw material for industry. Equally important are the vital life processes carried out by nature, including stabilization of climate, protection of watersheds and soil, preservation of nurseries and breeding grounds, and so on. Conserving these processes cannot be divorced from conserving the individual species within natural ecosystems. Species and natural ecosystems make many important contributions to human welfare. Yet these very important resources are seldom being used in ways that will be able to meet the growing pressures of future high demands for both goods and services that depend upon these natural resources. Many ecosystems that are rich biologically and promising in material benefits are severely threatened. Vast stocks of biological diversity are in danger of disappearing just as science is learning how to exploit genetic variability through the advances of genetic engineering.