section_path: Human interactions with ecosystems/Degradation and decline
section_name: Degradation and decline
paragraph_text: Degradation and decline
  
  As human population and per capita consumption grow, so do the resource demands imposed on ecosystems and the effects of the human ecological footprint. Natural resources are vulnerable and limited. The environmental impacts of anthropogenic actions are becoming more apparent. Problems for all ecosystems include: environmental pollution, climate change and biodiversity loss. For terrestrial ecosystems further threats include air pollution, soil degradation, and deforestation. For aquatic ecosystems threats also include unsustainable exploitation of marine resources (for example overfishing), marine pollution, microplastics pollution, the effects of climate change on oceans (e.g. warming and acidification), and building on coastal areas.
  
  Many ecosystems become degraded through human impacts, such as soil loss, air and water pollution, habitat fragmentation, water diversion, fire suppression, and introduced species and invasive species.
  
  These threats can lead to abrupt transformation of the ecosystem or to gradual disruption of biotic processes and degradation of abiotic conditions of the ecosystem. Once the original ecosystem has lost its defining features, it is considered collapsed (see also IUCN Red List of Ecosystems). Ecosystem collapse could be reversible and in this way differs from species extinction. Quantitative assessments of the risk of collapse are used as measures of conservation status and trends.