Balance is a crucial thing. Without it we would be lost in a state of instability, unable to function properly. Much the same as humans need to maintain a sense of equilibrium, so do ecosystems require stability. As the US Environmental Protection Agency defines it, an ecosystem is a place with unique physical features creating habitats where animals, people, and plants interact with one another and their physical environment. It supplies such life-sustaining essentials as clean air and water, fertile soil for agriculture, pollination, and flood and disease control.

Human wellbeing thus depends on the services provided by our ecosystems. Ecosystem services include, among others, moderating weather extremes and their impacts, mitigating drought and floods, preventing erosion, decomposing wastes, maintaining biodiversity, controlling agricultural pests, protecting humans from ultraviolet rays, and contributing to climate stability. These actions clearly improve our way of life. However, not wishing to limit our standard of living, we have taken deliberate actions to better meet our growing needs. We have founded new settlements for our growing population, dammed rivers and created artificial lakes, and thanks to new farming technologies we can now grow bigger and better crops. All of these are great achievements in their own right, but we must not deny that they also disrupt the balance of our planet. Our natural environments have been reduced by these new settlements. Dammed rivers and artificial lakes have had a negative impact on the species of the area. High-tech farming has often been the cause of erosion and polluted water supplies. Unfortunately, ecosystem services are so large in scale that it is hard to imagine that our everyday activities could have such a devastating effect on them.

Human actions clearly disturb the delicate balance of ecosystems, undermining the environment’s vital role in our lives. According the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, a research study initiated by the United Nations to better comprehend the consequences of recent changes to ecosystems, in the last 50 years changes have been more rapid than ever before. Among some of the most daunting results, the study showed that more than 50 percent of the total area of half the ecosystems surveyed has been lost in the last 100 years. The Assessment also documented declines in 15 of 24 ecosystem services worldwide.

These changes affect the interactions within the ecosystems, and as a consequence, their functioning. As we rely on these ecosystems for our essentials, any drastic changes within them will also affect our livelihoods, diminishing the quality of our land, our water, our food, and our health. In order to protect the ecosystems which in turn protect our well-being, we must develop strategies to enhance awareness among the public so that the many benefits we receive from nature are not taken for granted.

As stated by the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, we are currently equipped with the knowledge and technology to improve the balance between humans and the environment. However, we shall not be able to reduce our impact on ecosystems “until ecosystem services cease to be perceived as free and limitless, and their full value is taken into account.” Unless our activities are carefully planned and managed in light of this information, the delicate balance will continue to be disrupted.