Celebrating World Environment Day
World Environment Day, on 5 June, celebrates the biodiversity of the natural world and highlights the importance of protecting our natural spaces. This year’s theme encourages us all to ‘take time for nature’. This World Environment Day, JCU’s Dr Conrad Hoskin, Senior Lecturer in Ecology, shares his passion for protecting the natural world.
For Conrad, there is no better place to work than in Townsville and the broader North Queensland region.
“I love working in the Tropics because of all the biodiversity on our doorstep," he says. "Rainforest, reef, dry forest and the arid zone all meet around here, which makes it exciting for biologists because you can visit so many different habitats within an hour or two. The mountains and rocky areas around here also contain localised species found nowhere else in the world.”
Humans depend on a healthy natural world, so it is essential that we all find time to protect it. For Conrad, this means reminding people of how wonderful nature is.
“I reckon the natural world is the most fascinating and beautiful thing. Any kid would agree with me on that. We need to find a way to keep that childhood fascination and love of the environment going into adulthood, so that we all inherently care for the natural world around us. We are still lucky in North Queensland to live among nature; it would be dismal without it.”