Word: habitats
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...population keeps building at the current rate, the most ominous effect is that millions of life-forms will become extinct. Humans, no matter how well behaved, cannot help crowding out natural systems. A survey of 50 countries by environmental researcher Paul Harrison showed that habitat loss, the most important factor leading to extinctions, rises in direct proportion to the density of the individuals that make up various species. Big animals often range over hundreds of square miles and increasingly collide with settlements. Smaller species, which make up most of nature's diversity, are affected by human activities in countless ways...
President Bush also has attacked Gore on the jobs-vs.-environment issue. / During a visit to Colville, Washington, last month, he chastised the Senator for advocating protection of the spotted owl, which is endangered because 90% of its old-growth forest habitat has been cut. "It's time to put people ahead of owls," he said, and mockingly challenged Clinton to endorse Gore's book...
...Habitat acquisition has attracted nearly universal public support. An unlikely coalition of environmentalists, commercial fishermen, native Alaskans and state legislators wants at least 80% of the money to be used to buy and preserve 202,000 hectares (500,000 acres) of prime fish and wildlife habitat, either by purchasing the land outright or by buying up the rights to exploit its resources. The advocates argue that since little more can be done to restore areas damaged by the spill, protecting the region's ecosystem from further harm is the next best option. Much of the land is privately held...
...advantages of habitat acquisition are manifold. Old-growth forests provide nesting sites for some of the bird species harmed by the spill. Watersheds and upland forests offer food and breeding areas for mink and river otter as well as salmon and other fish. Protecting prime habitat from logging and development will also benefit hunters, fishermen, kayakers, hikers and the growing tourist industry...
With so many groups vying for money, some are bound to go without. Trustees say privately that they will probably devote some of the settlement to habitat protection and scientific studies but bank most of it in an endowment. A preliminary plan could be released early next year. But given the competing claims and heated emotions, it, like the Exxon Valdez spill itself, will almost certainly leave in its wake a residue of anger and disappointment...