5. Endangered Species
 
Definition:
 
They are the plant and animal species in significant danger of extinction.  Environmental Protection Agency
 
What are some of the problems related to this issue?
 
Habitat destruction, introduction of exotic species, and over exploitation are the primary causes for the various species to become instinct., Lauren Kurpis, endangered.net
 
Black rhino populations fell from 60,000 in 1970 to 2,500 in 1990 as poachers targeted their horns.  African elephant numbers fell from 1,200,000 in 1970 to 600,000 in 1989 as a result of the trade in ivory.  There are believed to be fewer than 50,000 Asian elephants left in the wild.  World sturgeon catches for caviar declined from nearly 28,000 to 8,140 tons between 1982 and 1994.  An estimated 100 million sharks, skates and rays are caught every year. 
There may be fewer than 5,000 tigers surviving in the wild.  Wild Aid
 
The single greatest threat of extinction that looms over most Asian wildlife and especially the tiger, according to a number of experts in the field, are the massive demands for traditional medicine.  The annual consumption of traditional remedies made of tiger bone, bear gall bladder, rhinoceros horn, dried geckoes and a plethora of other animal parts is of phenomenal proportions. It is believed that today at least 60 per cent of China's billion-plus inhabitants use medicines of this type. The booming economies and personal incomes of Southeast Asia have caused demand and prices to soar, lifting the international trade in wildlife products to an estimated $6 billion-a-year business.  tigersincrisis.com
 

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