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Biodiversity plays a central and vital role in sustaining life on Earth for humans and creatures all over the planet. Ironically, the natural processes that make the planet inhabitable are often forgotten about. Some of these services include:
- Transfer of energy from sunlight to plants and its distribution throughout food webs. This service is required in the Earth's ability to produce food for all of the creatures on the planet, big or small, human or otherwise.
- Storage, release, and distribution of carbon are essential building blocks of all life forms. Forests, oceans, and the atmosphere take center stage in balancing the levels of carbon found on the planet. This service makes the presence of soil, plants, animals, humans - everything! - possible.
- Cycling of nutrients , such as nitrogen and phosphorus, between the air, water, soil, and living organisms. Key organisms found in healthy ecosystems are responsible for decomposing and bi odegrading our waste, and generating and renewing the soils that produce our food crops, and providing us with the nutrients required for our bodies to support themselves.
- Water cycle , which purifies and distributes Earth's fresh water. Because of the hydrological cycle, the water found in the clouds was once found in the soil, in a nearby marsh, or in your drinking glass. The water cycle is what makes the world's most precious resource available for all living beings.
- Oxygen cycle , through which plants and animals exchange carbon dioxide and oxygen. What one man's (or species') trash is another one's treasure; this relationship has never been more poignant than in the oxygen cycle.
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