Yet Sir Peter Crane sounded a strongly cautionary note about the new developments. "If we're serious about biofuels, we're going to have to produce them in a much more sustainable way than intensive agriculture has given us in the past," he said.

The implications of biodiversity loss for the global environment have been widely discussed, but only recently has attention been paid to its direct and serious effects on human health. Biodiversity loss affects the spread of human diseases, causes a loss of medical models, diminishes the supplies of raw materials for drug discovery and biotechnology, and threatens food production and water quality. Science is rapidly proving beyond any doubt that if we are to preserve our own personal health, we must protect the natural systems that make all life on this planet possible... and that means protecting the health of the ecosystems and individual species around the globe.

From the tropical forest trees that produce the oxygen we breathe, to the temperate mountain forests that filter our drinking water and regulate the levels of our aquifers, we are intimately dependent on the ecosystem services provided by healthy, intact natural systems. Therefore, it is imperative to our health, and the health of the planet, that we educate ourselves how to limit our negative impact on the environment and promote positive changes and technologies which will propel us toward a healthy planet.