Set up by the Environmental Protection Agency, the Endangered Species Act of 1973 is designed to protect and aid in the full recovery of all imperiled plants and animal species. It requires the National Marine Fisheries Service and the U.S.Fish and Wildlife Service to develop and carry out plans to recover and aid all endagered species in the United States and its territories.

1. The act prohibits any action funded, authorized or carried out by federal agencies from jeopardizing the existence of an endangered species.

2. The act prohibits anyone from harming, killing or uprooting an endangered species.

3. The act demands that decisionsin the listing (or delisting) process be based solely on biological data.

The Endangered Species Act of 1973 gave more protection to 392 species that faced extinction. Since 1973, more than 550 species of animals and plants have been officially listed in imminent danger of extinction or threatened with extinction. Just 6 species have recovered: the Brown Pelican, the American Alligator,the Palau Dove, the Palau Owl, the Palau Fantail, and the Rydberg Milk-Vetch.

Since 1973, 7 listed domestic species have been declared extinct. During the 1980's alone, at least 34 animal and plant species met extinction without ever receiving full benefit of ESA protection. More troubling is data that more than 300 species may have gone extinct while awaiting listing decisions.

Today, there is a backlog of more than 600 severely imperiled species in Category I, warranting immediate protection. Over 3,500 more species exist in Category II: species suspected of being threatened or endangered, but about whom there is not enough information to qualify them for listing. At today's pace and level of funding, it could now take anywhere from 38 to 48 years to simply list those species now thought to qualify for protection.

The "ecosystem approach" is championed by conservation biologists who believe that endangered species protection would better served through regional conservation of biodiversity. Based on the preservation of individual communities of species and their physical environment, the idea is that entire ecosystems could be set aside and protected, leaving myriad interrelationships among all organisms to flourish.

(below is the double-sided printed copy of the endangered species act which Reef Relief widely distributes. It also details endangered species of the coral reef ecosystem.)

(click to enlarge and to see page 2)