Tropical islands like Fiji have suffered a 60 percent loss in biodiversity in less than 40 years, according to the 2010 edition of the World Wildlife Fund's (WWF) Living Planet Report.

Produced in collaboration with the Zoological Society of London and the Global Footprint Network, the report showed a decrease by 30 percent since 1970.

"There is an alarming rate of biodiversity loss in low-income, often tropical countries while the developed world is living in a false paradise, fueled by excessive consumption and high carbon emissions," the Fiji Live news website on Friday quoted Kesaia Tabunakawai, Representative of WWF South Pacific Program Office ( SPPO), as saying.

"We rely on this diversity of life to provide the food, fuel, medicine and other essentials we simply cannot live without. Yet this rich diversity is being lost at a frightening rate because of us. If current consumption trends continue, we may find we actually can't cure the harm we inflict on the Earth. This impoverishes us all and weakens the ability of the living systems on which we depend, to resist growing threats such as climate change," added Tabunakawai.

In this analysis, Fiji and the Pacific emerge in the category of tropical areas, where biodiversity continue to show a downward trend -- 30 percent decline since 1970. Most alarming (per biomes) species in tropical areas 60 percent decline; freshwater species 35 percent decline, with 69 percent decline of tropical freshwater species.

(Xinhua News Agency October 15, 2010)