The graph of destruction Current estimates suggest that we are losing one species a day from the 5-20 million species thought to exist. By the time human populations reach some sort of ecological equilibrium with their one-Earth habitat, at least a quarter of all species could have disappeared. The loss could even be higher, possibly one-third, conceivably more. Habitat destruction is now the most important cause of species loss. If present trends continue, we can expect an annual rate of loss as high as 50,000 species by the year 2000. At this point we would be driving 130 species into extinction every day.

Forest and Bird, Volume 21, Issue 1, 1 February 1990, Page 14

The graph of destruction Current estimates suggest that we are losing one species a day from the 5-20 million species thought to exist. By the time human populations reach some sort of ecological equilibrium with their one-Earth habitat, at least a quarter of all species could have disappeared. The loss could even be higher, possibly one-third, conceivably more. Habitat destruction is now the most important cause of species loss. If present trends continue, we can expect an annual rate of loss as high as 50,000 species by the year 2000. At this point we would be driving 130 species into extinction every day.