1. The services flowing from natural ecosystems are usually assigned dollar values in our "market-based" economic system
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2. Examples of ecosystem services include:
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3. Technological advances have heightened our awareness of the value of natural goods and services
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4. One of the commercially valued ecosystem goods is the annual world fish catch and recreational sport fishery, which together, total approximately
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5. Less than 5% of the world's energy consumption is supplied by fuelwood and other plant material
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6. The availability of most natural products (i.e. goods) is in decline due to:
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7. Biological diversity, or biodiversity, refers to the variety of life forms at all levels or organization, and is conveniently often quantified in terms of number of species.
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8. In the long run, we can rely on preservation efforts such as zoological breeding programs, botanical gardens and legally protected reserves, to sustain our earth's biodiversity
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9. Extractions from the world's genetic library are fueling the biotechnology industry, accounting for:
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10. The commercial value of pharmaceuticals used in traditional medicine exceeds $40 billion/year, with 85% derived from plants
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11. Biological life plays an important role in regulating the earth's climate by:
| 12. Transpiration (release of water vapor from the leaves) of plants in the morning causes thunderstorms in the afternoon, demonstrating an ecosystem's ability to exert direct physical influence on local weather.
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13. Today, soil degradation induced by human activities afflicts nearly ______% of the earth's vegetated surface.
| 14. Soil microorganisms are key to decomposition of wastes such as plastics
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15. The vast majority of flowering plants require animal pollination for successful reproduction
| 16. Although the European honeybee is threatened, the diversity of natural pollinators is increasing, due to climatic warming.
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17. As a strategy for fighting crop pests, chemical pesticides have many drawbacks, except:
| 18. Foremost among the immediate threats to ecosystem services are:
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19. Threats to ecosystem services are thought to be driven by two underlying forces associated with the unsustainable growth of the human enterprise: population size in per capita consumption and ___________:
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20. The Biosphere 2 experiment attempting to duplicate the earth's environment failed in large part due to unexpected problems with the systems'__________:
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