CH-20 HUMAN

INFLUENCE
ON
ECOSYSTEMS
FOOD SUPPLY
• Humans have increases food production with the help of :
- modern agricultural machineries - helps to use large area of
land for cultivation and improve the efficiency in food
production.
- chemical fertilizers - provides essential minerals and nutrients
to crops and improves crop yield.
- insecticides - improves quality and quantity of yield.
- herbicides - reduces competition with weeds and increases
crop growth.
- selective breeding- improve production in crops and
livestocks, increased yield with disease resistance
MONOCULTuRE FARMING
• Cultivation of single crop species in a specific land
continuously.
• Advantages:
- easier to manage, more efficient, higher earnings,
improves agriculture technologies.
• Disadvantages:
- reduces ecosystem diversity, increased pest issues,
insecticide issue.
Intensive livestock production
• It refers to the rearing and managements of animals like
cattle, poultry, sheep for meat/ milk/ egg/ fiber/ leather
etc.
• Advantages:
- help the economy and agriculture industries, food
security,
- Disadvantages:
- easy speed of diseases, welfare issues of livestock.
Habitat destruction
• Biodiversity- variety of species living in an area.
Habitat is a natural home for any species.
• Habitat destruction reduces biodiversity.
- Reasons for habitat destruction:
• increased area for housing, crop production and
livestock production.
• extraction of natural resources.
• freshwater and marine pollution.
- altering food web and food chain have an negative
impact on habitat
Deforestation
• Clearing of trees -example of habitat destruction, results in
• biodiversity reduction - loss of diverse plants and animal
species.
• extinction - species extinct as they are unable to adapt.
• loss of soil - tree roots can no longer hold soil together results
in decreased fertility and soil erosion.
• flooding - trees regulated water flow, soil erosion leads to
flooding in surrounding areas.
• increase CO2- as there are no trees to use CO2. higher levels of
green house gases leading to global warming and climatic
changes.
 Pollution
• Harmful substance get into environment and
makes things unsafe for living things.
• Human activities have led to the pollution of
water, land and air.
• Aquatic pollution is polluted with human
waste like untreated sewage, pesticides and
excess fertilizers used in agriculture. When it
enters the marine ecosystem it forms a layer
where there is not enough oxygen for life to
thrive.
• This is called eutrophication.
Eutrophication
• excess supply of nitrates and ions taken up by
algae.
• excess growth of algae.
• when algae dies, decomposed by bacteria,
increased decomposition.
• increased aerobic respiration by decomposers,
reduction in devolved oxygen.
• other organisms cannot survive and dies.
Discarded plastics
• Non biodegradable plastics do not break down naturally
over time.
• they persist in the environment without being
decomposed for a longer time
• have harmful effect on:
• aquatic ecosystem- disrupt the natural balance and
harms marine life, animals get trapped, eat plastics,
injured etc. plastic releases harmful chemicals: Water
polluted by contamination.
• terrestrial ecosystem- soil pollution: contaminates soil
and affects plants and nutrient cycle, harm animals,
spread of micro-plastics,
Air pollution
• methane from livestock (gas released) , landfill
(trash broken down without air)
• carbon dioxide from fossil fuel burning for
energy, industrial releases.
• effects:
• traps heat in atmosphere, increases green house
gases effect leading to global warming and
climatic change.
• raising sea level, alternate weather pattern,
impacts ecosystem and lives.
Conservation
• Taking care of natural resources for proper use and future use.
• a sustainable resource is one that is produced as rapidly a it is removed from the environment and does not
run out.
• Some resources can be managed sustainably,
• forests- education, protected areas, legal quotas, replanting
• fish stocks- education, closed seasons, protected area, control of net types and mesh sizes, legal quotas,
monitoring.