Monmouthshire Biodiversity Partnership

 
 

Biodiversity is a word that we are coming across more more andNew Grove Meadows more every day, but what does it mean?

Biodiversity is short for biological diversity and simply means the variety of life. The variety of life is all the living things that occur in the natural world and the variation between them, from algae to oak trees, bacteria to blue whales. 

However, Biodiversity is not just about the number of species that occur in a place, it also includes the interactions within and between species and their genetic variation. Biodiversity also includes communities of species, habitats and ecosystems. We must not forget that Biodiversity also includes us, and how we interact with other species and our environment. 

Biodiversity is not just restricted to rare or threatened species, although Monmouthshire has plenty of both, it encompasses all living things in the natural world, from those that are common to those that are critically endangered. 

 
Biological Diversity is:

'The variability among living organisms from all sources including among other things terrestrial, marine, and other aquatic ecosystems and the ecological complexes of which they are part; this includes diversity within species, between species and ecosystems.'

Taken from Article II of the Convention on Biological Diversity (Earth Summit, Rio 1992)
 

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