Half of all land must be kept in a natural state to protect Earth
Published 20 Apr 2019, 22:53 BST

A California sea lion hunts for fish on a kelp paddy at Cortes Bank, a seamount off the coast of San Diego. It's a trove of marine life that deserves protection, conservationists say.
Photograph by Brian Skerry, Nat Geo Image Collection
Camel thorn trees in Namib-Naukluft Park, Namibia look like a painting when photographed at dawn.
Photograph by Frans Lanting, Nat Geo Image Collection
Orphan elephants mudding in a human-made waterhole in Tsavo East National Park, Kenya.
Photograph by Michael Nichols, Nat Geo Image Collection
Fire burns through a wheat field in Madhya Pradesh, India. The region has experienced worsening drought over the years.
Photograph by Matthieu Paley, Nat Geo Image Collection
Grand Prismatic Spring, the world's third largest hot spring, is seen from above in the Midway Geyser Basin of Yellowstone National Park.
Photograph by Paul Chesley, Nat Geo Image Collection
In Palau's biodiverse waters, scientists find life is thriving under the seas. Here, a tiny goby camouflages with a branch of red coral.
Photograph by Enric Sala, Nat Geo Image Collection
A goliath birdwing hatches in a kitchen in West Papua, Indonesia.
Photograph by Evgenia Arbugaeva, Nat Geo Image Collection
Pivot irrigation must be done in a circular pattern. Seen from above, a farmer rakes hay into windrows.
Photograph by Michael Melford, Nat Geo Image Collection
A giraffe fawn grazes from a tree in Loisaba Wilderness in northern Kenya. Giraffes' primary food source is acacia leaves, which most other herbivores cannot reach.
Photograph by Ami Vitale, Nat Geo Image Collection
Rich soil called Palouse loess covers the rolling fields of eastern Washington in the western U.S.
Photograph by Michael Melford, Nat Geo Image Collection
Workers harvest celery from a farm in California's Salinas Valley. The region is famous for agriculture.
Photograph by George Steinmetz, Nat Geo Image Collection
A park ranger at Lewa Wildlife Conservancy in Kenya is nuzzled by an 18-month-old black rhino named Kilifi who was hand-raised with two other baby rhinos.
Photograph by Ami Vitale, Nat Geo Image Collection
Ziglab Dam in Jordan has seen six years of drought. Measuring sticks record how much water has been lost.
Photograph by Paolo Pellegrin, Nat Geo Image Collection
Phoenix, Arizona, built in the middle of a desert, requires vast amounts of water to keep its suburbs green.
Photograph by Vincent Laforet, Nat Geo Image Collection
A woman attempts to clean what is left of her home in the mountains of southern Haiti weeks after Hurricane Matthew.
Photograph by Andrea Bruce, Nat Geo Image Collection
Children play on the shore of Manila Bay in the Philippines, which is polluted by household waste, plastics, and other trash.
Photograph by Randy Olson, Nat Geo Image Collection
Plastic caught on a barbed wire fence.
Photograph by John Burcham, Nat Geo Image Collection
The Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah.
Photograph by Carolyn Drake, Nat Geo Image Collection
A Kurdish family picnics in Sulaymaniyah, Iraq.
Photograph by Photogrpah by Yukri Kozyrev, Nat Geo Image Collection
Fleeing from a predator, emperor penguins swim at the water's surface in Antarctica.
Photograph by Paul Nicklen, Nat Geo Image Collection
A couple embraces at Crater Lake in Oregon.
Photograph by Corey Arnold, Nat Geo Image Collection
Colorful fish swim above a healthy reef in the Lesser Sundra Islands, Indonesia.
Photograph by Stocktrek Images, Nat Geo Image Collection
Kids pick through garbage thrown off a bridge to find pieces they can sell to recycle shops.
Photograph by Matthieu Paley, Nat Geo Image Collection
A worker harvests palm fruit on a plantation in Sarawak, one of two Malaysian states on the island of Borneo. These mature trees are about 25 years old, which means they will soon be cut down and replaced.
Photograph by Pascal Maitre, Nat Geo Image Collection
Wildflowers undergo a 'superbloom' in Death Valley National Park thanks to high amounts of rainfall from the previous year.
Photograph by Jonathan Irish, Nat Geo Image Collection
Pools of evaporating salt water produce slurries of different colors in Niger.
Photograph by George Steinmetz, Nat Geo Image Collection
Conservation rangers and Congolese Army soldiers conduct a long range patrol to locate and destroy an armed rebel group.
Photograph by Brent Stirton, Nat Geo Image Collection
A girl splashes in Lake Urmia, Iran. Summertime bathers wade into waters colored red by salt-loving bacteria and algae. Tourists from across Iran have come here for generations, but the number of visitors has fallen as the lake has shrunk by 80 percent since the 1980s.
Photograph by Newsha Tavakolian, Nat Geo Image Collection
A glacier disintegrates in Norway.
Photograph by Photogrpah by Michael Melford, Nat Geo Image Collection
Bangladeshi migrant workers unload sand from Indian-owned boats on the Thane Creek, India.
Photograph by Photogrpah by Adam Ferguson, Nat Geo Image Collection
At a coal terminal, railcars loaded with coal line up to fill waiting ships in Virginia.
Photograph by Robb Kendrick, Nat Geo Image Collection
The lava at Nyiragongo in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is made of an alkali-rich volcanic rock.
Photograph by Photogrpah by Carsten Peter, Nat Geo Image Collection
At Jumeirah Beach in the United Arab Emirates, a solar-powered, 21-foot Smart Palm provides a Wi-Fi signal, charging station, lamppost, bulletin board, security camera, and emergency call button.
Photograph by Luca Locatelli, Nat Geo Image Collection
Climate change is impacting flora and fauna across the Arctic. Although scientists don't know specifically what killed this individual polar bear, experts warn that many of the bears are having trouble finding food as the sea ice they historically relied on thins and melts earlier.
Photograph by CRISTINA MITTERMEIER, Nat Geo Image Collection
Reza Manafzadeh works on a fruit-tree farm at the edge of a Lake Urmia, Iran, where crops are irrigated by a new method—recycled factory water brought by tanker truck.
Photograph by Newsha Tavakolian, Nat Geo Image Collection
Access roads and terraced fields erase Sarawak's rolling lowlands in Malaysia.
Photograph by Mattias Klum, Nat Geo Image Collection
Tania López, seven, plays with her cat in a room in her Guatemala home where walls were blackened by an old open fire. The new stove, provided by StoveTeam International, is efficient and safe to touch.
Photograph by Lynn Johnson, Nat Geo Image Collection
Beef sits on display at a supermarket in Dallas, Texas.
Photograph by
Brian Finke, Nat Geo Image Collection
After sheets of clear plastic trash have been washed in the Buriganga River, a woman spreads them out to dry so they can be sold to a recycler in Bangladesh.
Photograph by Randy Olson, Nat Geo Image Collection
In the Cave of Crystals in Naica, Chihuahua, Mexico, massive beams of selenite dwarf three explorers.
Photograph by Carsten Peter, Nat Geo Image Collection
The historic center of Cerro de Pasco, Peru, has been largely consumed by a quarter-mile-deep mine, now operated by a subsidiary of Volcan Compañía Minera. The mine produces mostly lead and zinc.
Photograph by Tomas van Houtryve
Giant Sequoia trees tower in the old growth forest of California's Sequoia National Park.
Photograph by Keith Ladzinski, Nat Geo Image Collection
Parakeets with cobalt-colored wings flock to a pool to eat clay in Yasuni National Park, Ecuador.
Photograph by Tim Laman, Nat Geo Image Collection
The Yanan expressway crosses under the North-South expressway in Shanghai, China.
Photograph by Andrew Moore, Nat Geo Image Collection
Parents do what they can to protect their children from dangerous smog in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, one of the world's most polluted cities. Here a mother adjusts her son's mask before he walks to school.
Photograph by Matthieu Paley
Steam and smoke rise from the cooling towers and chimneys of a power plant in Juliette, Georgia.
Photograph by Robb Kendrick, Nat Geo Image Collection
A night view of a waterfall and icicles in Iceland, accented by the northern lights.
Photograph by Babak Tafreshi, Nat Geo Image Collection
In Canada's moss-draped Great Bear Forest, a Kermode bear eats a fish.
Photograph by Paul Nicklen, Nat Geo Image Collection
A worker uses a mallet to dislodge frozen tuna from a Chinese cargo vessel docked at the port of General Santos in the Philippines.
Photograph by Adam Dean, Nat Geo Image Collection
Fireflies in flight in the forest at Santa Clara Sanctuary in Nanacamilpa, Mexico.
Photograph by Kirsten Luce, Nat Geo Image Collection