The last tortoise

The UN used World Environment Day earlier this month to launch a report highlighting the problems facing the conservation and management of biodiversity in the face of the many assaults humans are making on the natural environment. The report — Dead Planet, Living Planet; Biodiversity and Ecosystem Restoration for Sustainable Development — highlights not only the preservation of natural ecosystems but the value of investment in degraded systems that can bring about economic benefits. The report marks the year 2010, which was the target for a range of biodiversity goals set almost two decades ago by the UN's Convention on Biological Diversity. The achievements are generally disappointing, with just individual success stories lightening the assessment (see page R496–R497). And what is becoming increasingly apparent is the lack of haste in the face of ever-quickening environmental and ecological change. Under current circumstances, two decades of unsatisfactory results is time that can barely afford to have been lost. Some researchers are now talking about a sixth wave of mass extinctions, almost wholly the result of man's activities, and one group of animals highlights this prospect and the wider problems worldwide that face conservationists. A new book, The Last Tortoise, by University of Southern California biologist, Craig Stanford, looks at the lessons these often neglected animals Biodiversity 2010: The UN marked this year with a special day this month, but the targets it set two decades ago to stem species losses have proved disappointing and one group of animals highlights the range of problems facing conservationists. Nigel Williams reports. Star liability: The Burmese star tortoise is being driven towards extinction in Myanmar by its value in the pet trade. (Photo: The Last Tortoise).