The study conducted by researchers from Stockholm University (Sweden) and the Royal Botanic Gardens of Kew (United Kingdom) analyzed the extinction of plants worldwide. The results, published in the publication Nature Ecology & Evolution, warn that the rate of plant extinction has been 500 times faster than that of animal species. Since 1900, three plants have disappeared every year.
“Most people can name a mammal or bird that has gone extinct in the last few centuries, but few can name a plant that has disappeared,” says Aelys Humphreys, a professor at the Department of Ecology, Environment and Plant Sciences at Stockholm University and one of the authors of the paper. “With this study, for the first time, we have an overview of which plants have already gone extinct, where they disappeared from and how quickly this is happening.”
