All language subtitles for Extinction.The.Facts.2020

Our planet is home

To a seemingly infinite
variety of species...

From ocean giants...

To the tiniest insects.

We call this abundance
of life biodiversity.

But today it's vanishing

at rates never seen before
in human history.

A u.N. Panel
of experts has found

that one million animal
and plant species

face extinction.

It is worse than expected.

This is happening much faster
than we have ever seen before.

Today
we are the asteroid

that's causing many,
many species to go extinct

simultaneously.

The evidence is
that unless immediate action

is taken, this crisis has
grave impacts for us all.

We're not just losing
nice things to look at.

We're losing critical parts
of earth's system.

And it's threatening our food,

our water, our climate.

This year has shown us
we've gone one step too far.

Scientists have even linked

our destructive
relationship with nature

to the emergence of COVID-19.

We're encroaching
further and further

every day into wildlife habitat,

and that drives
emerging diseases.

If we carry on
like this,

we will see more epidemics

as bad as this, and some of them
could even be worse.

The decisions made

as we rebuild our economies
are critical.

Get it wrong,
and we

will be in deeply
dangerous territory.

Get it right,
and we still have the ability

to pull back and rein in
the collapse of biodiversity.

We have a moment

when we can change our world

and make it better.

This is that moment.

Over the course of my life,
I've encountered

some of the world's most
remarkable species of animals.

Only now do I realize
just how lucky I've been.

Many of these wonders seem set

to disappear forever.

We're facing a crisis

and one that has
consequences for us all.

It threatens our ability
to feed ourselves,

to control our climate.

It even puts us at greater risk
of pandemic diseases

such as COVID-19.

It's never been more important
for us to understand

the effects
of biodiversity loss,

of how it is that we ourselves

are responsible for it.

Only if we do that
will we have any hope

of averting disaster.

In 2019,

the United Nations asked
over 500 scientists

to investigate the current state
of the natural world.

This is the first time
there's been a global assessment

where all the evidence has
been pulled together,

thousands and thousands
of papers.

We're losing
biodiversity at a rate

that is truly unprecedented
in human history.

All groups

in the natural world
are in decline,

which means their populations
are getting smaller day by day.

Since 1970,

vertebrate animals...
Things like birds,

mammals, amphibians,
and reptiles...

Have declined by 60% in total.

Large mammals have
on average disappeared

from 3/4 of the range where they
were historically found.

What's different is that
it's happening simultaneously

in the Amazon,
in Africa, in the arctic.

It's happening not at one place

and not with one group
of organisms,

but with all biodiversity
everywhere on the planet.

It means
that one million species

out of 8 million species
on earth

are now threatened
with extinction...

500,000 plants and animals

and 500,000 insects.

Extinction is
a natural process.

Things come, they grow,
their populations get huge,

and then they decline, but it's
the rate of extinction.

That's the problem,

so when you look at previous
groups in fossil records,

then it's over millions
of years, they go extinct.

Here, we're looking
at tens of years.

Since 1500,

570 plant species

and 700 animal species

have gone extinct.

Studies suggest
that extinction is

now happening a
hundred times faster

than the natural
evolutionary rate,

and it's accelerating.

Globally,
there was a shock

because you hadn't pulled
all that data together,

that people hadn't
realized that we have

a very serious crisis
on our hands.

Many people think
of extinction being

this imaginary... tale

told by conservationists,

but I have lived it.

I know what it is.

I am caretaker of
the northern white rhinos.

We only have two left
on the planet.

They are mother and daughter.

Good girl.

This is najin,

the mother, who is 30 years old.

She's very quiet.

And her daughter is fatou.

This is fatou. Hey, come on.

Hey, fatou.
Fatou, now, come on.

She is 19 years old.
Stop it.

She... pretty much like
a human teenager.

She's a little bit unpredictable

and can be feisty sometimes,

especially when she
wants something.

Northern white
rhinos were once found

in their thousands
in central Africa,

but were pushed to
the brink of extinction

by habitat loss and hunting.

By 1990,

just 7 known individuals
survived.

I have seen
these beautiful rhinos

count from 7 down to 2.

They are here
because we've betrayed them.

And I think they feel it,

this threatening tide
of extinction

that is pushing on them.

They feel their world
is collapsing.

Unless science saves them,

when najin passes away,

she will leave the daughter,

fatou, alone forever...

The last northern white rhino.

And their plight awaits
one million more species.

Once we lose
these species,

we do not have hope

of accumulating them back

on a timescale that we exist on.

Unique animals
with complex and varied lives

disappearing from
our planet forever

isn't just disturbing,
it's deeply tragic,

but this is about more than
losing the wonders of nature.

The consequences of these
losses for us as a species

are far-reaching and profound.

What we now know
about the natural world

is that everything
is joined up...

From a single pond to
the whole tropical rainforest.

All of biodiversity
is interlocked

on a global scale,
and all parts of that system

are required
to make it function.

We tend to think that we're
somehow outside of that system,

but we are part of it,

and we are totally
reliant upon it.

The problem is
we're now changing

those ecological systems
on a massive scale

right across the globe...

And its threatening food
and water security.

We're losing many of the things
that nature provides for us.

One of the big threats
is the loss of insects.

We've estimated 10% are
at risk of extinction.

Other scientists believe
the number could be much larger.

Driving around,
we don't have moths,

butterflies, bees,

all sorts of insects
in our windshield anymore.

And that is scary

because they form the food chain

for hundreds of thousands
of other species,

and they are extremely
important for pollination.

Three-quarters
of the world's food crops

rely partly on pollination
by insects

to produce the food
that we need.

Another threat is

the loss of diversity
below ground.

Soil should be
teeming with life,

but reports have suggested
that up to 30%

of the land's surface globally
has been degraded

and has soils
of low biodiversity.

One of the most important
things that animals

in the soil do is break down
organic matter...

Which can then be used
for plant growth...

So if we lose diversity
of the soil,

the consequences of that
can be catastrophic.

♪

We're seeing already
that, due to soil degradation

and changes
in the earth's climate,

food production in some parts
of the world is going down.

Unfortunately, the most affected

would be poor people
in developing countries,

but there's no question
everybody in the world,

one way or another,
is being affected

by the loss of biodiversity.

One of
the really big problems

is what's happening to plants.

The picture is grim.

25% of the plant species
that have been assessed

are threatened
with extinction...

One in 4 plants.

I find that terrifying.

Plants underpin almost every
single thing that we require.

Think of the air we breathe,

concentration of co2 in the air,

clean water.

Trees regulate water flow
across landscapes,

intercept the rainfall,

and the roots
hold the soil in place...

So you chop
all those trees down,

there's nothing doing that.

You end up with a landslide.

We've learnt that
many, many times,

and yet we carry on
making the same mistake.

The impacts
of biodiversity loss

are no longer a threat for
future generations to face.

We ourselves must do so.

It's never been
more critical for us

to understand
what is driving this crisis.

Scientists have
identified the key ways

in which we humans are
destroying the ecosystems

on which we depend.

♪

There are many ways
to remove pieces of the puzzle.

The most obvious way
is to kill something,

and we do a lot of that.

Over the last 20 years,

the illegal wildlife trade
has become

a multibillion-dollar,
global industry.

♪

One of
the biggest-ever hauls,

worth more than £4 million...

326 pieces were seized.

Was found
in a shipping container.

Poaching
is still sort of like a war,

a constant battle
that we have to fight.

Every day, we lose between
two or 3 rhinos in Africa,

and it is not just rhinos.

We're talking
about millions of animals

being snatched from the wild
from thousand of species.

The illegal wildlife
trafficking ranks fourth

of the transnational crimes

after human trafficking,
arms, and drugs.

One of the drivers
for increasing demand

is increased income in China,
Vietnam, or elsewhere.

If you have money,
if you have Internet,

you can literally order
anything that you want.

It could be a status symbol,

or it could be
for medicinal purposes...

But it's all made up.

People claim these
are cultures and traditions,

but a lot is really
just marketing scheme

by traders looking
for the next animal to exploit.

Today the most
trafficked animal in the world

is one few people have ever seen

and many have
never even heard of.

♪

Pangolins are nocturnal animals

found throughout
Asia and Africa.

They're natural
pest controllers.

Each one can consume
70 million ants a year.

Pangolins are the only mammal
covered in scales,

and this is their downfall.

The massive demand
in Asia for pangolin scales

is driving the decimation
of pangolins.

Traders claim that
they have medicinal purposes,

but, you know, pangolin scales
are made of keratin.

It's like our fingernails,

so they have
no medicinal properties.

All right, sweetheart.

Woman, voice-over: The numbers
of African pangolin scales

that have been intercepted
going into Asia

has dramatically increased
over the last few years.

In 2019, it was just over
a hundred tons of scales.

That's 175,000 pangolins

that have been killed
for the scale trade.

We work closely with
law-enforcement officials.

This little pangolin
came in off the trade,

and they're usually
dehydrated and emaciated.

This pangolin's still got
the little, white tips

at the end of each scale,
which shows his youth,

and this is a particularly
pretty, little pangolin.

Wright, voice-over: Poaching
is a brutally cruel business.

I have seen video footage
of them being boiled alive.

It's extremely distressing

to see how these animals
are killed.

♪

When COVID-19
first emerged,

pangolins were pointed to as
a potential source of the virus,

and everybody hoped that
this would cut down the trade

straightaway,
but, unfortunately,

that's not happened.

The trade is highly profitable,
and it's unlikely to stop.

There are 4 Asian
pangolin species and 4 African,

and all 8 species are
threatened with extinction.

♪

There is another huge trade

that is driving
the loss of biodiversity,

and this one happens
in plain sight.

♪

We have created
a database

that has world fisheries'
statistics,

and we were the first ones
to study fisheries

on a global basis,
and this global view

shows that we have massive
and widespread overfishing.

In the last 40 years,

the scale of global fishing
has dramatically increased.

At any one time,
there could be as many

as 100,000 trawlers
operating in our seas.

Modern fishing
is an industrial operation

run by huge corporations.

Boats are factory ships.

Some sweep up the ground
with a net

that might be
as big as this house,

and you can put 4 jumbo jets
in the mouth of a big trawler,

and everything
that is in the path goes in.

The problem is,
as you remove more and more

of the adult fish, particularly
the larger-sized fish,

you end up with fewer and
fewer of the eggs and the fry,

and there's simply not enough
for the population to recover.

There are ways of sustainably
managing fish stocks.

Reducing fishing in an area

can get a population back
to sustainable levels.

But you have to choose
whether you want

to extract a sustainable,
modest catch

or have a big catch
for a short term,

and we have always opted

for the big catch
for a short term.

Even where fish quotas
are put in place,

often, they're
not being implemented,

and in some parts of the world,
there's not even

good regulations
to limit the catches.

The waters
around major fishing countries

are being emptied.

We found that in China,
we have about 16% left

of what we had 120 years ago,

and studies suggest
that some British waters

where industrial fishing begun
have been decimated.

There is now about 5%
of trawler-caught fish left

than before the turn
of the 20th century.

This is a really big
problem for the species of fish

that prey upon the fish
that we're harvesting,

and this has huge impact
on the marine ecosystems.

We're completely
destroying the natural balance

of fish in the world's oceans.

Across the globe,
the pressures faced

by the natural world are
becoming ever harder to solve

because of our growing demand
for nature's resources.

When I was a kid
in the 1960s,

there were 3 billion people
in the world,

so I watched it go to
6 billion, around 2000 or so,

and I'm now probably
going to see it actually reach,

you know, 9 billion
in my lifetime,

which is pretty startling.

Population growth
is much, much higher

in the developing world
than in the developed.

But it's problematic
to just talk about population

because there are two things
which are going on.

It's population,
but it's also consumption.

And in terms
of impact on the planet,

what's much more important

is the growth
in consumption levels,

and these are far higher
in the developed economies.

That's why I call it
a taboo topic,

because who's at fault?

Is it the very large
number of people

or the small number of people
with very few children

who are actually driving
negative impacts?

The average person in the UK

consumes nearly
4 times the resources

of the average person in India,

and in the United States,
it's about 7 times as much.

♪

One of the problems is that
many of the products we use

are manufactured in ways

that pollute our air, land,
and water, making pollution

another of the drivers
of biodiversity loss.

While in a country
like the United Kingdom,

we have some very strong laws
on how to reduce pollution,

we do have to realize,

we're no longer
a major industrial country.

Most of the things
that we actually use

are produced abroad in countries

where the laws can be
nonexistent or not implemented,

so we're simply
moving our footprint

on destroying nature
to another country.

Pollutants
can have a lasting impact

on species, an impact
that may take time

for us to fully understand.

Pcb stands for
polychlorinated biphenyls.

They're used
in the electrical industry.

We invented them
in the twenties,

and then we began to ban them
from the eighties onwards

because we realized
they had quite a serious

and toxic effect on life.

They affect the immune system,

and they also cause
reproductive impairment.

If pcbs are not
disposed of appropriately,

then you can get leaching out
from the landfill site

into river courses,
riverbeds, back out to sea.

Animals at the base
of the food chain

might absorb
a very small amount.

Then as animals above them
eat more and more

of the small animals, they'll
concentrate up the food chain.

♪

In the UK, we have one really
striking example of that...

The last remaining pod
of inshore killer whales

up in northwest Scotland,

where they only have
8 individuals left.

That population has been
studied for about 30 years.

In all that time,
they have never had a calf.

Lulu was a part of that pod.

She died due to entanglement
in fishing gear...

And when we had her blubber
levels analyzed for pcbs,

they were quite shocking,
one of the highest levels

ever recorded of any
killer whale on the planet,

and we looked at her ovaries,

and we found
they were nonfunctional.

In my lifetime,
we're looking potentially

at the complete loss
of that population,

and then we'll have
no more killer whales left

around the coast of the UK.

In addition
to these threats,

many ecosystems are
increasingly feeling the impact

of another driver
of biodiversity loss...

Climate change.

Our world is getting hotter.

At this moment,
we do have the Paris agreement

that says all governments
should try and limit

climate change to no more
than two degrees celsius.

All of the calculations show

we're on track
for a 3-to 4-degree world,

and the more the earth warms,
the worse the problem is.

There are lots of ways
that climate change

will impact on species...
Changing food sources,

how they breed,

and their whole patterns
of migration and movement.

Increasing
temperatures mean some species

are unable to survive
in their normal habitat.

They're forced to move higher
and higher, where it's cooler,

and eventually,
there's nowhere left to go.

It's been called
the escalator to extinction,

and we see it
all around the globe.

In the Australian
wet tropics,

we're already seeing that
with possums and birds

that just can't handle
the heat waves.

About 50% of the endemic
species that live

in these mountaintops are on
that escalator to extinction.

These are no longer predictions.

We are seeing it happen.

Scientists
predict that in the future,

as temperatures
continue to rise,

climate change will become

the greatest threat
faced by species...

♪

But right now,
the single biggest driver

of biodiversity loss is
the destruction of habitats.

Many people
imagine there's

this untouched wilderness
because they see it

on their TV screens,
but the reality is,

there's really not a lot
of wild left out there.

We've already lost nearly 90%

of the wetlands
around the world.

We've transformed the forests,
our grasslands.

We've converted 75% of the land
that is not covered by ice.

3/4 of the terrestrial
surface has been changed,

a lot of it just
to feed one species.

♪

Obviously,
if you clear a rainforest

or natural Savannah
and you replace it

with a monoculture agriculture,
of course... it's unsurprising...

You're going to lose
most of the species

that evolved to survive there.

The critical thing
is that there is now

enough land that's
already been cleared

to sustain the levels
of production that we need,

but new land
is still being cleared

because often, it's quicker
and cheaper to do so.

It's estimated
that every year,

around 3.8 million hectares
of forest are cleared.

A lot of
that clearance is driven

by demand
on the other side of the world.

We want cheap food,
and we want to have choice

on offer all year round.

These commodities often provide

the mainstay
of countries' economies,

but many are produced in ways
that are not sustainable.

So a consumer
walking into a supermarket

may unwittingly be contributing
towards loss of biodiversity.

What we're doing is taking
customs data, shipping data,

and for the first time,
we connect them all together

and ask, "who's buying
from the hotspots

where we're really
losing biodiversity?"

We now have enough data
to be able to identify

the main drivers
of biodiversity loss...

Soy, cocoa, coffee,
palm oil, and beef.

Conversion
of land for cattle

is probably the greatest
single cause of habitat loss.

Of the total mass
of mammals on earth,

livestock has been found
to account for 60%,

humans for 36%,
and wild animals just 4%.

♪

The unprecedented impact
we are having on the planet

is not only putting the
ecosystems we rely on at risk.

Scientists believe that
our destructive relationship

with nature
is actually putting us

at greater risk
of pandemic diseases.

We've seen
an increasing rate

of pandemic emergence.

We've had swine flu,
SARS, ebola,

and we've actually looked back
over every emerging disease

and said, "where did it
originate on the planet",

"and what are the things
going on there

that could have caused it?"

And we found we're behind
every single pandemic,

and it's human impact
on the environment

that drives emerging diseases.

Animals have lots
of different viruses

that circulate inside
their bodies just like we do,

and so one of the most obvious
ways that we're making it

more likely that
a virus would jump

is that we're having lots
of contacts with animals.

The wildlife trade
is at unprecedented levels.

We have huge markets with tens
of thousands of live animals

shedding their viruses
through feces and urine

being killed in front of you.

These are incredible places
for viruses to spread...

And we're connected
to that trade

through the things
like the fashion industry.

We've seen this huge increase
in the use of fur trims

for winter jackets,

and that means hundreds
of thousands of animals

are bred in fur farms.

You have
large densities of animals

put in a situation
with a lot of people.

To make things worse, those
animals are very stressed,

and we know that animals
that are stressed

shed viruses at higher rates.

♪

What also drives
emerging diseases...

Is that we're encroaching
further and further every day

into wildlife habitat.

31% of all emerging
diseases have originated

through the process
of land-use change.

Forests around the world, where
there's a lot of biodiversity,

have thousands of viruses

that we've never
come into contact with yet.

The minute we build
a road in there,

we start getting exposed.

The first people
into those logging camps

go out and hunt bush meat
and pick up the viruses.

That's how HIV emerged.
Then we bring our livestock in.

Viruses move from wildlife
into livestock into people.

At every step of the process,
we're bringing people

closer in contact with wildlife
and their viruses.

It's easy to imagine
that we're so far away

from these diseases' origins

that it's nothing to do with us,

but we drive it, actually.

Our consumption of beef
drives this.

Our consumption
of poultry and the products

that are used in poultry
drives this.

♪

My research is showing
that when humans

convert habitat, there is also
something else at play.

It's not all species that
are likely to make us sick.

Often the best reservoirs
for the pathogens

that can jump to humans
are smaller-bodied species,

like rats and mice
and certain kind of bats.

When we have intact natural
systems with high biodiversity,

these species are kept in check,

but when humans destroy habitat,

the large predators and
herbivores disappear first,

which means the smaller-bodied
species are the big winners.

They proliferate wildly.

They live at super high density

and are the ones far more
likely to make us sick.

So we've been saying
for 20-plus years

that this exploitation
of our environment

is driving pandemics...

♪

But what we didn't think was,

it was going to happen so
quickly and so devastatingly.

Since
the first cases of COVID-19

were identified in China

and linked to a wet market
in Wuhan,

scientists around the world
have been piecing together

where and how the virus emerged.

It was
figured out quickly

that it was a coronavirus.

Those are known to reside
in various kinds of animals,

and so people started
looking for the animal

from which that coronavirus
would have jumped into people.

We found the closest
relative to the virus

in bats in rural south China
in yunan province.

It's really well-known
for its biodiversity of plants

and of animals, including bats,

and they live in these
incredibly complex colonies.

One part of the colony
is a nursery

where all the kids live,

and the parents fly out
every night to get food,

but yunan has been
under incredible change

for the past few decades.

High-speed rail links
have gone in there.

Roads have been built
into remote areas,

and so we think COVID-19
maybe started there,

and either somebody
got infected and traveled

to Wuhan themselves or sent
animals that they were shipping

into the wildlife trade
into those wet markets,

and then the virus
exploded from there.

We don't know exactly
what happened yet,

but it's my view that it's
our relationship with nature

and the way we interact with it

that drove
the emergence of covid.

We've been
changing biodiversity

in really critical ways

that made this
more likely to happen.

If we continue
on our current pathway,

then what we've
experienced in 2020

might not be a one-off event.

We estimate
there are going to be

5 new emerging diseases
affecting people every year.

We cannot live with that
and the rate

at which they're increasing
and crashing our economies.

If we have one of these
every decade,

we cannot persist
with that level.

We face
a frightening future.

So how has it come to this?

Why haven't we acted sooner
to address these issues

and stem the loss
of biodiversity?

Many scientists,
including myself,

have been saying
for the last 25 to 30 years

that biodiversity is being
lost due to human action.

Thousands arrive for the
largest u.N. Meeting ever held

in an effort to prevent drastic
and irreversible changes.

I'm here to speak
for the countless animals

dying across this planet.

We are a group
of 12- and 13-year-olds

come to tell you adults
you must change your ways.

In 1992
at the earth summit,

a convention was signed
to protect biodiversity.

It was recognized to be
of critical importance

to the future of earth.

The bleak warning
from scientists

as a major u.N. Conference
in Japan...

In 2010, governments
came up with 20 targets

to protect biodiversity.

While we're making some
progress, to be quite candid,

we probably will not meet
any of the targets.

Part of the problem
is that we don't have

really good environmental laws
that are global.

Also, unfortunately,
many in the private sector

make a huge profit at the
expense of our natural world.

They want
the status quo to exist.

The reality is,
our world is based

on economic growth,
grabbing more and more.

Thank you for joining us

to examine
the extinction crisis.

The evidence is unequivocal.

Watson, voice-over:
Even today, there are people

that will do anything
in their power

to make sure that
the politicians do not act.

I'm here to tell
you that the 3 lead authors

here from the u.N.
Are part of this con

that the United Nations
presents itself

as "the world's"
expert on science.

Watson, voice-over: At recent
congressional testimony,

two of the republican
witnesses argued

that the loss of biodiversity
was nowhere near as serious

as what we were saying
in the report.

As with the manufactured
climate crisis,

they are using the specter
of mass extinction

to scare the public
into compliance.

We've wasted
20 to 30 years

when the governments
of the world,

working with the private sector,

could have done a much better
job conserving biodiversity.

♪

If we've had acted
more seriously,

many species
could have been saved,

and we would not be facing
such serious threats

as we're seeing today.

This year
has shown the vulnerability

of our societies.

Will we take the opportunity,
finally, to change our course?

What can governments,
industries,

and we, as individuals, do

to slow this decline
of the natural world?

♪

The world has been
on pause during the pandemic,

and as we begin to move forward,

we have a moment
when we can change the way

we're running our world
and make it better.

This is that moment.

The first thing
that we have to do

is to reset the way
we run our economies.

The massive hit
to the economy is no surprise.

The world
is in a recession.

Governments are recognizing
that they have to invest

to drive out of it,
and I've been involved

in a study
with the finance ministries

and the central bank
governors of the world

in thinking through

what the best ways
out of this crisis are,

and we found
that those investments

which are good
for the environment

are very powerful ways
out of the depression

that we find ourselves in,
so, for example,

we could begin work
on restoring degraded land.

We can plant trees.

We can start
retrofitting buildings

so they're much more efficient,

make our cities much cleaner.

All those examples
can be done quickly.

They are labor-intensive

and are strong
economic multipliers,

so exactly the kind of things
you need for a strong recovery.

There are all these things
we know we have to do

for biodiversity
and for the climate,

so let's bring them forward
to this period of unemployment,

and then going forwards,
we need to dramatically change

the damage that we do
from producing and consuming.

That's the big prize.

♪

At the moment, nature
is coming as a free good.

We use rivers
and estuaries as sinks

for the pollution
we create from industry,

and who's paying for that?

Large chunks of the rainforests
have been converted

at prices which are
astonishingly low,

given the cost
to the rest of the world.

As an economist,
I think it's right

that people who extract
from nature pay the due price.

We have to recognize
that nature has true value

that is taken into consideration

in national accounts.

We also need to start producing
affordable food

without expanding any further
into the forests.

This is indeed quite possible.

One of the biggest problems
is incredible.

We actually waste about 40%
of the food that is produced.

If a farmer
can't produce stuff

in exactly the right form,
he has to throw it away,

and, of course, we throw it
away from the plate.

If we could
reduce that food waste,

it would go a long,
long way to making

a more sustainable
agricultural system,

and also, we need to reduce
the amount of chemicals.

We've got to make sure
we're not degrading our soils.

We need the best of the private
sector to show the others

they can make a profit
and still conserve nature.

Another possible
solution is to make more rules.

There does have to be
some standard.

We can't simply depend
upon people of goodwill

and institutions of goodwill to
do what is needed to be done.

If governments impose
legislation that says,

"we will not be allowing
the imports of products

that are produced in
an unsustainable way,"

then it levels
the playing field.

Lots of people don't
like government regulation,

but there are some
tremendous success stories

of international
legal cooperation.

Back in the 1980s,
scientists figured out

chemicals used in aerosol spray
or used in refrigerants

were actually eating
the ozone layer.

About a million tons of
cfcs are produced every year.

The nations
of the world got together,

and they banned these chemicals,

and the problem
was solved because

once the manufacturing
companies started looking

for alternatives,
they found them quite quickly,

so we shouldn't be demoralized

because we know
how to do this stuff.

It's a question of finding
the political will to do it.

We shape the future
of the planet irretrievably

by the decisions we take
in this next few years

and indeed in the months now

as we come
out of the covid crisis.

♪

For those of us who care
about the future of our planet,

you know, we have to look
at our lifestyles,

and we can't look away
from our own behaviors.

40 years ago,
people consumed

a good deal less
in the United Kingdom,

but there is no evidence

that we were unhappier then
than we are now.

We can be more diligent
about thinking

about what we're
consuming and when.

It's really digging down,

saying, "what's going on here?
Where does that come from?"

We need to think about
meat and dairy consumption.

That's not to say that
none of us should ever eat meat

or should cut all dairy
out of our diets,

but we have to demand that
they are produced sustainably.

Increasingly, I feel,

it's not just about
our current lifestyle,

but about the education
of our children

on the way nature works.

There's a wave
of revolution going around,

especially with young people.

We are waking up.

We're realizing that the planet

is an integral part
of our existence.

If we don't act now,
the youth of today

and the youth of tomorrow
are going to look back

on this generation
with absolute horror.

"What were you thinking?"

I want to tell her that
we have taken the lessons,

that we will not allow

any other species to walk
this tragic road of extinction.

♪

One thing
we do know is that

if nature is given the chance,
it can bounce back.

40 years ago, I had

one of the most memorable
experiences of my life.

I was in
the virunga mountains...

Which straddle
the borders of Uganda,

the Democratic republic
of Congo, and Rwanda...

And there I met some of the few
remaining mountain gorillas,

including a mischievous
youngster called poppy.

As I sit here,
there's more meaning

and mutual understanding
in exchanging a glance

with a gorilla

than any other animal I know.

As I was
preparing to talk to camera,

poppy was at my feet
trying to take off my shoes.

♪

It was an experience
that has stayed with me,

but it was tinged with sadness,
as I thought

I might be seeing
some of the last of their kind.

In the 1970s, this
population of mountain gorillas

was estimated to be around
250 individuals in this area.

They were on the brink
of extinction.

Their habitat was under
very rapid conversion

from forest
to agricultural fields.

This part of
Rwanda was one of the poorest

and most densely populated
in the country,

and the expansion of agriculture

was the only way
for most people to survive.

There were tensions

between the park
and communities.

We had many poachers coming,

setting out snares,
cutting bamboo.

Co-existence of
humans and mountain gorillas

really wasn't a reality
that many people saw...

But over the next few decades,

the situation
would start to change.

Government in all 3 countries,
conservation organizations,

and local communities
started to work together

with an emphasis
not just on the gorillas,

but on the people
that lived with them.

We have over
200 rangers, and their jobs

is to see every gorilla
and check on the habitat,

and since 2005,
the government set up

a tourism
revenue-sharing scheme.

A portion of
the price that a tourist pays

is actually reserved
for those communities adjacent.

The result is that
the conversion of habitat

for agricultural production
actually ceased,

and the population
has recovered.

I think they are...

Uwingeli, voice-over: 30 babies
were born in this park

last year, and we know
that these figures

are going to grow.

No one will be
a victim of poachers,

so things have changed.

Their numbers
have just reached

and exceeded 1,000.

This change
has not happened overnight,

but if it can be
achieved here...

Where human-population
pressure is so high,

where the politics
can be very complicated,

especially among
different states...

I believe it can be achieved
elsewhere, as well.

♪

Poppy grew up

and actually was a very
long-lived mountain gorilla

and had many offspring.

Wait. Wait, wait, wait.

Urarabu
is right there,

right there, the two.

Uwingeli, voice-over:
Urarabu is actually

the daughter of poppy.

He's trying to nudge her.

Uwingeli, voice-over:
"Urarabu" means flower.

She is a shining flower
in this park.

Urarabu
also has a daughter.

Urarumbuke. Prosperity.

♪

To see poppy's daughter

and granddaughter thriving
is thrilling.

It just shows
what we can achieve

when we put our minds to it.

I do truly believe
that together,

we can create a better future.

I might not be here to see it,

but if we make
the right decisions

at this critical moment,
we can safeguard

our planet's ecosystems,
its extraordinary biodiversity,

and all its inhabitants.

What happens next
is up to every one of us.

♪

♪

Extinction the facts

is available on
Amazon prime video

♪