Climate change and the loss of biodiversity are two of the biggest environmental crises we face. This is because of the cascade of impacts they have for our wellbeing, food production, water supply, flooding, equality, and peace.
Rewilding helps tackle climate change by helping nature to capture and store carbon. By letting nature be itself, carbon dioxide is captured through photosynthesis and stored in the plant, particularly wood, and it can eventually end up in the soil. The more carbon stored in plants and soil the less remains in the atmosphere.
In a global assessment of the state of nature across 218 countries, Britain ranked 189th! Only 29 countries have more degraded nature than we do. The amount of wildlife we will save will depend on how much space we give to nature. The more space we give, the more species will survive. The best supported ‘rule’ in ecology is called the ‘species area relationship’, which states that the bigger the habitat the more species it will hold.
These habitats will support even more plants and animals if they are connected to related habitat through wildlife corridors. Rewilding is all about giving more space to nature, connecting those places up, and making sure important species, like beaver, are returned to them.