International Mother Earth Day on April 22

• The United Nations General Assembly proclaimed April 22 as International Mother Earth Day through a resolution adopted in 2009. 

• The Day recognises the Earth and its ecosystems as humanity’s common home and the need to protect our planet to enhance people’s livelihoods, counteract climate change, and stop the collapse of biodiversity.

• It aims to raise global public awareness of the challenges to the well-being of the planet and all the life it supports. 

• Climate change, man-made changes to nature as well as crimes that disrupt biodiversity, such as deforestation, land-use change, intensified agriculture and livestock production or the growing illegal wildlife trade, can accelerate the speed of destruction of the planet.

• The planet is losing 10 million hectares of forests every year — an area larger than Iceland.

• A healthy ecosystem helps to protect us from diseases. Biological diversity makes it difficult for pathogens to spread rapidly.

• It is estimated that around one million animal and plant species are now threatened with extinction.

• That is why we need to recover our ecosystems. Ecosystems support all life on Earth. The healthier our ecosystems are, the healthier the planet — and its people. 

• Restoring our damaged ecosystems will help to end poverty, combat climate change and prevent mass extinction. 

• The Day also recognises a collective responsibility, as called for in the 1992 Rio Declaration, to promote harmony with nature and the Earth, to achieve a just balance among the economic, social, and environmental needs of the present and future generations of humanity.

(The author is a trainer for Civil Services aspirants.)