Many more species and habitats are in danger of disappearing or being fragmented. On a world scale the rate of loss is a cause for serious concern, requiring concerted international action to prevent continued loss of biodiversity. In a local context, biodiversity is important in giving a distinctive character to an area whether it be chalk downland, heathland, woodland or river valley. Even in towns, areas of wildlife habitat make an important contribution to the quality of life. The conservation of biodiversity is essentially the same as nature conservation but with a renewed emphasis on the importance of all species, from the commonplace to the critically endangered.
Biodiversity is an international concept but one founded very strongly on local action.
By conserving the diversity of biological organisms in every local area, global biodiversity will thus be conserved. The Biodiversity Action Plan is closely allied to the Local Agenda 21 process and aims to involve everybody not only those governmental and non-governmental agencies and organisations normally involved in nature conservation. However it looks to these bodies to lead in the process. The concept of biodiversity gained international recognition at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. Here, the UK government committed itself to conserving biodiversity within its territory and, in 1994, it set up a national steering group to develop a UK Biodiversity Action Plan which it endorsed 1994.