[Animals] Abalones and dugongs are under threat of extinction, warns the IUCN Red List

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(CNN) -- The effects of human activity, from climate change to pollution, are "devastating" marine life, with nearly a tenth of underwater plants and animals assessed so far under threat of extinction, this report showed. Friday the most recent Red List of Threatened Species.

The report's release coincides with a UN nature summit in Montreal, where Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged countries to end an "orgy of destruction" and approve an agreement to halt and reverse the loss of habitats.

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More than 1,550 of the 17,903 marine plants and animals assessed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) are at risk of extinction, according to the latest list, which acts as a barometer of biodiversity and is published several times a year.

"It shows that we are having a pretty devastating impact on marine species," said Craig Hilton-Taylor, head of the IUCN Red List.

"Underwater, you can't really see what's going on. So assessing the status of species gives us a real indicator of what's really going on there, and it's not good news."

 

 

According to Hilton-Taylor, the proportion of marine species threatened with extinction is likely to be much higher than current data shows, as those analyzed so far have tended to be widespread fish species, not currently threatened.

According to the IUCN, po[CENSORED]tions of dugongs, a plump, gray-colored herbivorous mammal commonly known as a sea cow, have dwindled to fewer than 250 adults in East Africa and fewer than 900 in the French territory of New Caledonia.

Among the threats they face are the loss of their main source of food, seagrass beds, due to oil and gas exploration and production in the case of Mozambique, and pollution from nickel mining in the Pacific.

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The latest list reviews abalone species for the first time, a type of mollusk sold as luxury shellfish, finding that around 44% of them face extinction. Increasingly severe and frequent marine heat waves have caused mass mortality, fueling disease and wiping out their food sources, the IUCN says.

In South Africa, poaching has "devastated" some abalone po[CENSORED]tions, while pollution from agriculture and industrial runoff has "eliminated" other abalones in part of the Arabian Peninsula," the IUCN said in a press release. .

 

https://cnnespanol.cnn.com/2022/12/11/abalones-dugongos-bajo-amenaza-extincion-lista-roja-uicn-reux/