Caretakers versus Exploiters: Impacting Biodiversity in the Age of Humans

Introduction

Imagine a standard analog clock. The time it takes for the hour hand to make an entire revolution around the clock is 12 hours. Think of those twelve hours as the amount of time the Earth has been in existence. Of those 12 hours, human beings have only been on the Earth for 14 ½ seconds.¹ This is the Neozoic Era, the Anthropocene, the age of humans. The history of humans on Earth is very short, merely a blink of an eye in the history of all life on Earth. The human species originated in Africa. We are all descendants of these oldest humans found on the planet.

Africa is the second largest continent on Earth. It is a vast plateau. Africa has many large megacities as well as areas that are less populated with indigenous people. As the youth population of Africa grows, urban areas will continue to grow.² The Atlantic Ocean lies on its west coast and the Indian Ocean lies on the east coast. The Mediterranean Sea is to the north. The equator goes right through the middle of the continent, meaning that most of Africa lies in the tropic zone. The continent of Africa has many different biomes. The biomes that are most prevalent on the continent are the tropical forest, the grassland, and the desert, although there are also wetlands and mountains. Being in the tropical zone means that it is very hot, with little to no change in temperature. Because of this, the changes in climate center around rainfall. The wettest part of Africa is the Congo rainforest, which is just north of the equator. From there, the continent gets drier and drier as you travel away from the rainforest. As you move out of the tropical zones into the more temperate zones, there is very little forest because of the lack of rainfall.³

Africa is home to a widely diverse collection of animal and plant life. It is said to be home to more than 50,000 known plant species, 1,000 mammal species, and 1,500 bird species.⁴ Indigenous people of Africa and traditional African societies rely on these species for survival. There are many things about their culture that show how they live in harmony with nature, and there are many things that they can teach us. Some of the indigenous tribes include the Maasai of the grassland, the !Kung of the desert, and the Efe of the tropical forest.