Source: Toronto Website

Specifically after World War II, food has been only viewed as a source of energy. In more recent years, the food we have today has dramatically risen to be a sensory, cultural, social phenomenon and also gave a boost in technological progress. An enormous wave of high food quality and food variety has followed from the recent discoveries in nutritional sciences. The foods we eat affect our bodies, and how they function. Today, we expect our food to be “tasty, safe, cheap, healthy, available all year round, “as natural as possible,” varied, and sometimes elegant and exotic.” Food has now become more than just a means to survive.

According to the EUFIC (European Food Information Council), probiotic and prebiotic has made a big impact and are now widely used due to the positive effects it has made. The technology we have today has made it possible to place probiotic lactic acid bacteria in food such as, yogurts; which deemed to improve bowel function. Probiotics seem to survive through the stomach and small intestine and replace harmful micro-organisms. They also play a role in colon cancer prevention and many other diseases prevention concerning more in the digestive area.

NEWSFLASH! Master-packed product is electronically monitored when being fed into SureBeam's irradiation chamber to ensure proper radiation dosages. Electronic beams that pasteurize beef has recently come out 7 years ago in 2003. I’ve just read about electronic beams 10 minutes ago, and how low level dosage can kill 99.9 percent of Salmonella in poultry and E. coli in ground beef! Amazing. Apparently, it had been an epic struggle to gain approval for irradiated meat from the state health officials; but finally, they gave an okay in favor for pasteurized beef, pork, and poultry, which means - eat up! This can help erase the fear of salmonella from affecting our insides.

Artificial selection is an intentional breeding for specific traits or combination of traits.


Why so serious?

Pouty lips - check!
Big, deep, light eyes - check!
High def. cheek bones - check!
Cute little nose - check!
What else? I'd like my daughter to grow up like one of them, thanks.

Exactly the point! Who cares? Do we care? Well of course we do, but does any one of us take action? Yeah! Many do take action but in spite of everything, several fail to notice the changes and effect in life. We, humans, must take responsibility on how we affect the biodiversity of our ecosystems, be it positively or negatively.

First things first, what does biodiversity mean to us? “Biodiversity boosts ecosystem productivity where each species, no matter how small, all have an important role to play,” (Global Issues article). For example, when there is a big variety of species it can guarantee natural sustainability for all beings so basically, its “all for one and one for all.” The tropical forests, wetlands, and coral reefs are several of the threatened ecosystems. From fishermen to mailman and everyone else in the world, affects the environment around us. It all happens through polluting, threatening, harvesting, over fishing, littering and many other horrendous “-ing’s”. (But of course, it’s not entirely all “-ing’s” fault.)

Aside from all the negativity about our human interventions having an effect on the biodiversity of our ecosystems, there is also the plus side. Yes, something less gloomy and more enthusiastic on how we see life. Even though, we rarely see any positive affects, we still need that encouraging optimism and the wonderful productivity we’ve done to so far to keep us going. Several people may support environmental activities to help preserve the “beauty” of Nature but it’s not truly a justifiable reason as it is a biased view. For many numbers of years, various environmentalist, biologist, and scientists from all over the world think of earth entirely as one massive living life form in view of the fact that all living species mutually depend on each other. It suggests that ecological balance and biodiversity are crucial for all earth, not just humans. So we are not all as horrible as we think we are.

International and Nationwide organizations work together to change the conditions of the world. One of the breakthroughs that positively affect our ecosystems is the organization of TEEB (The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity). It is a major international initiative that attracts attention to the global economic benefits of biodiversity that highlights the growing costs of biodiversity loss and ecosystem degradation. They help enable access to leading information and tools to improved biodiversity practice for the business community and help raise awareness. Given the fact that coral reef is one of the threatened ecosystems, it is one of the things TEEB are concerned about. Scientists and the government contribute to the process of saving the coral reef through hardcore thinking and investments. This is just one of the many organizations out there that are working hard in their own way of preserving the biodiversity of our ecosystem. Even though the situation is an irreversible damage, at least they’re trying.

"These TEEB findings demonstrate that climate change and biodiversity loss must be tackled together. They lend further support to the EU's goal of achieving a concrete and ambitious agreement in Copenhagen that comprises both reductions in the world's greenhouse gas emissions and the creation of global mechanisms to stop tropical deforestation. Quite simply, we will not manage to halt biodiversity loss if we do not mitigate climate change. And we will not be able to mitigate and adapt to climate change if we do not protect our valuable ecosystems and biodiversity."

And so, WE should also try! YOU and ME, Let us make a difference. Even simply doing the littlest of things such as, taking the bus instead of your car can make a difference. Do a good deed! Love earth, take care of it.