Wasps, Sharks, Vultures Deliver Key Ecosystem Services
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- Wasps are chronically overlooked pollinators and are evolutionary ancestors of bees.
- Parasitic wasps are specialist assassins already deployed in agriculture for pest control.
- Social wasps act as generalist predators that reduce populations of aphids, caterpillars, and moths.
- Sharks caused 65 unprovoked bites and 12 deaths worldwide in the last year.
- Shark and ray species have over 30% threatened with extinction, and about 100 million sharks are killed annually.
- Sharks have existed for nearly 500 million years, predating trees and surviving five mass extinctions.
- Popular culture portrays sharks, wasps, snakes, and mosquitoes as evil, yet there is no scientific evidence they possess moral agency.
Why it matters: Preserving wasps, sharks and other overlooked species safeguards pollination, natural pest control and marine ecosystem stability, while continued eradication threatens food security, biodiversity and the ecosystem services that underpin human health, agriculture, tourism and coastal economies worldwide and the resilience of natural habitats.
