Africa’s lions are disappearing at an alarming rate, owing to the degradation of their grassy woodland habitat. Using high-resolution satellite data, researchers from Duke University in North Carolina have calculated that Africa’s savannah has shrunk by 75% over the past 50 years, and that what remains is more degraded and fragmented than previously believed. In the same period, separate analysis suggests the lion population has declined from 100,000 animals in 1960 to fewer than 35,000.   Lead researcher Professor Stuart Pimm estimates that fewer than 500 lions remain in West Africa. (Washington Post)

The world is over-populated.  It may be that the rate of increased is lessening, but there will still be far too many people, and they are degrading the environment on land and in the oceans, some to simply survive, others, like those who kill elephants for tusks, out of greed and to produce dumb religious symbols. The major religions bear a huge responsibility for all this, particularly Catholics and Moslems, who attack family planning and have historically kept women in pregnant and in the kitchen. (And blessing ivory religious ornaments at the Vatican?  If there are saints let them preserve us!)

Who knows, it might already be too late to reverse the process.  But Epicureans can do their bit by living modestly, rejecting consumerism and supporting good things like better education for women and family planning.  Add your own good causes!