Preparing the International Year of Biodiversity in 2010

Four more weeks to go to upload your kid’s favourite biodiversity picture on www.seethebiggerpicture.org

The loss of biodiversity is a reality. Every hour three species disappear forever. Each year, more than 20 thousand species become forever extinct. The UN declared 2010 the International Year of Biodiversity (IYB). To support the UN’s initiative, Airbus, the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and National Geographic have teamed up to launch a world-reaching biodiversity photo contest, “See the bigger picture.”

With almost 300 000 young visitors to www.seethebiggerpicture.org, Airbus is creating a virtual community of children committed to biodiversity around the world. Kids celebrating the amazing variety of species on our planet and discovering the earth’s natural wealth have already uploaded almost 1000 pictures and voted for their preferred photo.

The “See the Bigger Picture” photo contest calls children of 6 to 16 worldwide to take photos of biodiversity, to illustrate the diversity of nature around them and to consider their role in conserving it.

Upload your pictures on www.seethebiggerpicture.org for a chance to win a trip to National Geographic’s headquarters in Washington D.C. and share your experiences of biodiversity.

’See the Bigger Picture’ is a joint initiative between Airbus, the National Geographic Society and the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). The initiative supports ’The Green Wave’ for biodiversity and it leads up to the International Year of Biodiversity in 2010. The photo competition was launched in June 2009 and ends on September 8th. It is a campaign designed to stimulate and raise worldwide awareness on biodiversity and the preservation of threatened ecosystems amongst children, families and educators.