Why is Regenerating Nature Important?

Regenerating nature means actively working to improve and restore the health and resilience of natural ecosystems, moving beyond simply minimizing harm and towards actively creating a thriving natural world. It’s important to emphasise the ecosystem here, it’s not just one species of plant or animal, it’s all of them that make up an ecosystem over time.

Why is it important?

Natural ecosystems are important for us to regenerate, because so many have been impacted by human activities. We have disrupted most ecosystem globally, and many have been damaged so much they no-longer function and the ecosystem has been either lost or changed dramatically.

Regenerating nature is a crucial part of climate resilience, because a healthy natural environment helps to reduce both the causes and effects of climate change. For example, forests and other natural environments, such as peat bogs, help to absorb the greenhouse gases that cause global warming. Meanwhile, wetlands act as a sponge that absorbs water during floods and releases it during dry periods helping to prevent the extreme conditions that can result from climate change.

How do we do it?

The easiest ecosystem to regenerate is the one that isn’t impacted in the first place. Therefore, before we go fixing what is broken it’s important to protect what we have left. Especially ecosystems that are at direct threat now.

Then it’s important to start locally. While this problem is true globally, we have much more control over our own area and there is lots of work we can do in Te Taitokerau to help nature rebuild and regenerate.

There are also major ecosystems internationally that are at particular threat from ongoing industrialisation and land and ocean clearing. Many countries who have fewer resources and less strict controls in place need globel support. You can donate to non-governmental organisations (NGOs) that specialise in this work.

Check out the Actions below for things you can do, or read more about Regenerate Nature