The earth s biodiversity is the source of all livestock, of all crops and pollinators of crops, of the biological agents that control crop pests, of many agricultural pesticides and pharmaceuticals, and of numerous ecosystem services essential to agriculture, including the creation of soils and the renewal of their fertility. Expanding human activities are threatening this biodiversity, and thus compromising the long-term sustainability, productivity, and stability of agriculture and society. Biological diversity, or biodiversity , includes both the number of different species and the number of genetically different varieties within species on earth.
Agriculture depends on both components of biodiversity.
Over 130 different plant and animal species are grown as major sources of human food, thousands of additional plant and animal species are harvested, and thousands more contribute directly and indirectly to agricultural productivity. High genetic diversity within each individual crop also is required if a crop is to be viable over the long term. This high genetic diversity is essential for developing crop strains and livestock breeds that are resistant to the diseases and other pests associated with the high densities of modern crop and livestock operations. Genetic diversity allows improvements in yield and quality, and development of varieties that can be commercially feasible in different soils or regions or in response to different market pressures. Because of recent advances in biotechnology, agriculture has the potential to draw on the genetic diversity of all species, not just crop or livestock relatives.