How can climate change affect biodiversity and ecosystem services?

How can climate change affect biodiversity and ecosystem services?

• A. It has no impact on biodiversity or ecosystem services.
• B. It alters temperature and precipitation, shifting habitats, affecting species distributions, and reducing ecosystem services.
• C. It increases ecosystem services in all regions.
• D. It only affects marine life.

Answer: (B)

Climate change reshapes the environment that living things inhabit, so it directly affects biodiversity and the benefits ecosystems provide. When temperatures rise or rainfall patterns shift, habitats move and change in quality, causing species to track suitable conditions by shifting their geographic ranges or changing the timing of life events (phenology). This can disrupt interactions among species—such as pollinators and the plants they rely on, predators and prey, or hosts and parasites—and can lead to local extinctions or altered community composition. These ecological changes ripple into ecosystem services. For example, changes in plant communities and pollinator availability can reduce crop yields and natural pollination; stressed forests may store less carbon and become more susceptible to pests and fires; altered hydrology can diminish the water purification and flood regulation provided by wetlands and rivers; ocean warming and acidification threaten coral reefs and other marine ecosystems, affecting fisheries and coastal protection. Overall, climate change tends to disrupt biodiversity and diminish many ecosystem services, rather than leaving them unchanged or uniformly increasing. Other options don’t fit because climate change does have widespread impacts beyond one group of organisms, and it does not universally boost ecosystem services in all regions or affect only marine life.

Climate change reshapes the environment that living things inhabit, so it directly affects biodiversity and the benefits ecosystems provide. When temperatures rise or rainfall patterns shift, habitats move and change in quality, causing species to track suitable conditions by shifting their geographic ranges or changing the timing of life events (phenology). This can disrupt interactions among species—such as pollinators and the plants they rely on, predators and prey, or hosts and parasites—and can lead to local extinctions or altered community composition.

These ecological changes ripple into ecosystem services. For example, changes in plant communities and pollinator availability can reduce crop yields and natural pollination; stressed forests may store less carbon and become more susceptible to pests and fires; altered hydrology can diminish the water purification and flood regulation provided by wetlands and rivers; ocean warming and acidification threaten coral reefs and other marine ecosystems, affecting fisheries and coastal protection. Overall, climate change tends to disrupt biodiversity and diminish many ecosystem services, rather than leaving them unchanged or uniformly increasing.

Other options don’t fit because climate change does have widespread impacts beyond one group of organisms, and it does not universally boost ecosystem services in all regions or affect only marine life.