2022 Wishes For a Sad, Little Planet?

It's a bit difficut to identify and rank, the important issues that our planet has to deal with. Most are focused on humans and our behaviours, a) because we are humans and b) our species is currently the major environmental 'influencer'. Should the issues be ranked in terms of urgency or magnitude or both? Are the issues, in any sense, separate, when there is there substantial overlap between them? Would you rank them differently or even have different categories? Here goes. For better or worse. 1. Planetary heating with consequent climate change This is very much down to humans (some much more so than others). There is no doubt, however, that climate change also has a powerful effect on many other organisms and could even render parts of the planet uninhabitable by humans and many other species. There seems to be finally a consensus on this issue but progress in dealing with it is glacially (do they still exist?) slow. 2. Loss of biodiversity The general health of the planet's ecosystems depends on a complex interplay between bacteria, fungi, animals and plants with non-living materials (the atmosphere, water, soil etc). Taking out particular organisms/ changing materials can have widespread repercussions. 'Conservation' is needed but does the planet actually benefit from all the changes produced by human choices? 3. Pollution In terms of its impact on the planet, pollution is a bit like a bird messing its nest. Humans have proved very effective at releasing materials into the environment. Materials include 'greenhouse gases'; petrochemicals; plastics; nitrous oxides; 'forever' chemicals; insecticides; herbicides etc: etc. They can have powerful impacts on climate change; viability of food chains; health of organisms etc. If humans become extinct, there will be a layer of plastics in the rock strata. 4. Pandemics As humans, we obviously focus on human disease, like Covid19. We have not proved to be especially good at dealing with this issue in spite of our advanced technologies. Humans, via their actions (e.g. 'factory farming' and transporting species) also, however, produce/spread pandemics for other organisms e.g. 'bird 'flu' and 'ash dieback'. Humans need to monitor pandemics much more effectively and deal with them in rapid and sensible ways. 5. The World-Wide Web This is a form of rapid communication that should only bring benefits, in terms of information flow. Electronic communication is also used, however, to spread misinformation, hate etc. A major problem has been, of course, the take-over of the www by commercial interests. Most of the highly profitable platforms are linked to product advertising. Advertising revenue is linked to 'readership' so 'click-bait' rules, OK? Misinformation can produce many more 'likes' than accurate information. 6. Migration Migration is a perfectly normal way for many animal species to deal with changing environments (seasonal or longer term). Humans are really no different. Humans migrations are generally triggered by wars and/or environmental problems. Our species has had a long tradition of changing locations, when this has seemed an appropriate response for them and/or their families. In some parts of the world, however, migration is almost treated as a crime. My 2022 wishes for the planet is that we make progress in dealing with or at least improving our responses to each of these 6 issues. Positive and urgent action is needed in all of these areas.