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A viral Forbes article claiming that koalas have become "functionally extinct" and that 80% of their habitat has been destroyed by Australia's devastating bushfires made its way around social media this weekend.
The problem is, it's not totally true.
Prince Harry's royal tour of Africa must be eye-opening. The royal recently wrote an essay published in The Telegraph stressing the importance of conservation, calling out the problem for what it is. "I have no problem in admitting that we are all part of the problem in some way, but a lot of us simply aren't aware of the damage that is being caused," wrote the Duke of Sussex.
Prince Harry details the consequences of neglecting and ravaging the environment. "Rivers and deltas have been overfished in an unsustainable manner - mainly to sell to neighbouring countries who have out-fished their own stocks. This only benefits the few who are selling them and leaves the communities that depend on them with nothing," Prince Harry wrote. West Africa loses an estimated $1.3 billion to illegal fishing each year. Senegal alone loses $300 million to the practice, which accounts for 2% of the country's GDP.
Well done, Canadians.
Sometimes the monstrous machine of industry and corporate greed can feel like too much for us as individuals to battle. But a bunch of Canadian citizens has just shown what a committed band of individuals can do.
In the first crowdfunding effort of its kind, Canadians have raised $3 million to purchase a stretch of coastal wilderness in British Columbia to save it from development. The 2,000 acres (800 hectares) of pristine coastline in the Princess Louisa Inlet on British Columbia's Sunshine Coast are virtually untouched. The land includes a fjord, the top rim of which branches into high alpine snow pack forming multiple dramatic waterfalls that run down the rock.
Crowdfunding efforts were organized by B.C. Parks Foundation, a non-profit group whose mission is to protect natural landscapes in the province. The foundation's CEO Andrew Day told the CBC that the land, which is being sold by a private owner, had some interest from logging companies and developers. So people stepped up to stop that from happening.
Well, that depends.
Nobody likes waste, but sometimes in our rush to eliminate it, we don't think through the consequences of our actions. Take, for example, the push to ban plastic straws.