Nearly 170 countries in this world and 12 of them contain 70% of the earth’s biodiversity India is one among the 12 mega biodiversity countries The Ministry of Environment and Forests, Government of India records 47,000 species of plant , 81,000 species of animals ,Which is about the 7% and 6.5% of global flora and fauna respectively.
BIODIVERSITY AT GLOBAL, NATIONAL AND LOCAL LEVELS:
Global Level: Conservative estimates of the existing biodiversity is ten million species, but if estimates for insects are correct then it could be around 30 million species, we have till now enlisted about 1.4 million species. It includes among others about 98% birds, 95% reptiles and amphibians, 90% fish and about 85% higher plants known to exist on this Earth. Most of the world’s bio-rich nations are in the South, which are the developing nations. In contrast, the majority of the countries capable of exploiting biodiversity are Northern nations, in the economically developed world. These nations however have low levels of biodiversity. Thus the developed world has come to support the concept that biodiversity must be considered to be a ‘global resource’.
National and Local Level: Geological events in the landmass of India have provided conditions for high levels of biological diversity. India has over 108,276 species of bacteria, fungi, plants and animals already identified and described. Out of these, 84 percent species constitute fungi (21.2 percent), flowering plants (13.9 percent), and insect (49.3 percent). In terms of the number of species, the insect alone constitute nearly half of the biodiversity in India. These species occur on land, fresh and marine waters, or occur as symbionts in mutualistic or parasitic state with other organisms. In the world as a whole, 16, 04,000 species of Monera, Protista, Fungi, Plantae and Animalia have been described so far. However, it is estimated that at least 179, 80,000 species exist in the world, but as a working figure 122, 50,000 species are considered to be near reality. It is estimated that 18% of Indian plants are endemic to the country and found nowhere else in the world. Among the plant species the flowering plants have a much higher degree of endemism, a third of these are not found elsewhere in the world. Apart from the high biodiversity of Indian wild plants and animals there is also a great diversity of cultivated crops and breeds of domestic livestock. This is a result of several thousand years during which civilizations have grown and flourished in the Indian subcontinent. The traditional cultivars included 30,000 to 50,000 varieties of rice and a number of cereals, vegetables and fruit. The highest diversity of cultivars is concentrated in the high rainfall areas of the Western Ghats, Eastern Ghats, Northern Himalayas and the NorthEastern hills.
