Q.Why do humans deliberately want to make any species extinct?
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🔒 Start your 14-day free trial to unlock the full solution →Concept understanding — Eradication Justification
Eradication Justification – A First Look
Think of a time you had to defend a decision that seemed harsh but was necessary. Perhaps a teacher removed a student from a group project because that student never contributed. The teacher had to justify that removal — not just say "I removed him," but explain why it was the right thing to do, even though it sounds extreme. That act of explaining why a removal or elimination is correct is, in essence, what Eradication Justification is about.
In the context of Indian commerce/humanities subjects — especially in Economics or Business Studies — this concept appears when we talk about poverty alleviation or social welfare programmes. The NCERT textbook uses it to explain why certain policies aim to completely remove a problem rather than just reduce it.
The Precise Meaning
Eradication Justification is the reasoning that supports the complete elimination of a problem (like poverty, illiteracy, or malnutrition) rather than merely reducing its severity. It argues that partial solutions are not enough — the goal must be zero.
Why does this matter? Because many policies settle for "less poverty" or "fewer dropouts." Eradication Justification says: if a problem is fundamentally harmful, the only morally and practically sound target is its total removal.
Eradication Justification is not about being unrealistic. It is about setting a standard that does not accept any level of the problem as acceptable. For example, the idea that "no child should go hungry" is an eradication justification — it rejects the notion that feeding 90% of hungry children is good enough.
Why It Matters in Your Syllabus
In NCERT's Class 11 Economics chapter on poverty, you will find that India's official poverty line is a tool to measure poverty, but the goal of poverty eradication goes beyond measurement. The justification for eradication is rooted in:
- Human dignity – Poverty is not just a lack of income; it strips people of choice and self-respect. Reducing it by a few percentage points does not restore dignity to those still below the line.
- Long-term efficiency – Partial measures often create dependency or leakages. Eradication demands structural change — better education, healthcare, and employment — which benefits everyone.
- Moral imperative – If we accept that some poverty will always remain, we are implicitly accepting that some people's suffering is acceptable. Eradication Justification rejects that.
How It Differs from Alleviation
| Alleviation | Eradication |
|---|---|
| Aims to reduce the problem | Aims to remove the problem entirely |
| Accepts some level of the problem as inevitable | Treats any level as unacceptable |
| Focuses on short-term relief (e.g., food subsidies) | Focuses on root causes (e.g., land reforms, education) |
| Easier to measure progress (e.g., poverty rate fell from 30% to 20%) | Harder to measure because the target is zero |
Beyond habitat loss (the single biggest indirect cause), humans also drive species extinct on purpose — usually for direct economic gain or to remove a perceived threat to their own interests. …
Direct, deliberate human-caused extinction is mostly driven by commercial over-exploitation and the elimination of species considered undesirable.
While habitat loss is the single biggest overall cause of extinction, humans also deliberately drive species to extinction through:
- Over-exploitation for economic/commercial gain — hunting and poaching for meat, fur, skin, ivory, horns, or use in traditional medicine (e.g., the extinction of the Steller's sea cow, near-extinction of tigers and rhinos for their body parts).
- Elimination of perceived competitors, pests, or predators — killing carnivores/predators that threaten livestock, or species seen as agricultural pests, to protect human economic interests. …
- CBSE 2025Set 57/4/13 marksQ.According to a recent wildlife report, the biggest threat to the tiger's survival in Mudumalai Tiger Reserve (MTR) was found to be a small, beautiful flower, Lantana camara, a tropical American shrub, that invaded 40% of India's tiger range. Tamil Nadu department's Lantana weed eradication drive helped to restore the dying MTR thereby also reducing human-wildlife conflicts. MTR is home to 25 species of grasses and legumes. Answer the given questions based on the information given above.(a) Explain how did the removal of Lantana help in restoring the dying Mudumalai Tiger Reserve.(b) Why is the invasion of Lantana camara a cause of concern in MTR.
›Reveal solutionSolution
Lantana camara is an invasive alien species that outcompetes native vegetation, disrupts food chains, and degrades tiger habitat. Its removal restores native grasslands and legumes, rebuilding herbivore populations and the prey base for tigers, thereby reviving the ecosystem and reducing human-wildlife conflict.
Understanding invasive species and ecosystem disruption
An invasive species is a non-native organism introduced into an ecosystem where it has no natural predators or competitors. Lantana camara, native to tropical America, behaves aggressively in Indian forests because the ecological checks that limit its growth in its native range are absent here. It spreads rapidly, forms dense thickets, and monopolizes resources like sunlight, water, and nutrients.
The key to understanding this problem lies in recognizing that ecosystems function as interconnected webs. A tiger reserve isn't just about tigers—it depends on a complete food chain: grasses and legumes support herbivores (deer, gaur, wild boar), which in turn support apex predators like tigers. When an invasive plant disrupts the base of this pyramid, the entire structure collapses.
(a) How removal of Lantana helped restore MTR
The restoration works through a cascade of ecological recovery:
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Native vegetation rebounds
When Lantana is removed, the 25 species of native grasses and legumes that evolved in MTR can reclaim their space. These plants are adapted to local soil, climate, and wildlife, forming the natural ground cover of the forest.
-
Herbivore food supply increases
Native grasses and legumes are palatable and nutritious for herbivores like chital (spotted deer), sambar, and gaur. Lantana, by contrast, is toxic to most herbivores and inedible. With native plants restored, herbivore populations can grow and sustain themselves.
-
Prey base for tigers recovers
Tigers are obligate carnivores that hunt medium to large herbivores. A healthy herbivore population means adequate prey density. More prey means tigers can hunt successfully within the reserve boundaries instead of wandering into human settlements.
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Reduction in human-wildlife conflict
When prey is scarce inside the reserve, tigers venture into villages and agricultural lands, leading to livestock predation and dangerous encounters. Restoring the prey base keeps tigers within their natural habitat, reducing such conflicts.
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Overall ecosystem health improves
Native plants support not just herbivores but also insects, birds, and smaller mammals. The entire biodiversity of MTR benefits, creating a resilient, self-sustaining ecosystem.
TipThink of Lantana removal as "unlocking" the ecosystem—it doesn't directly help tigers, but it removes the bottleneck at the producer level, allowing energy to flow up the food chain again.
(b) Why Lantana camara invasion is a cause of concern
The invasion threatens MTR at multiple ecological levels:
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Competitive exclusion of native flora
Lantana grows faster and denser than native species, shading them out and depleting soil nutrients. The 25 native grass and legume species cannot compete, leading to local extinctions and loss of plant diversity.
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Collapse of the herbivore population
With native forage replaced by inedible Lantana, herbivores face starvation or are forced to migrate. A 40% invasion across India's tiger range represents a massive loss of grazing habitat.
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Disruption of the predator-prey balance …
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- CBSE 2024Set ANNUAL3 marksQ.Why do humans deliberately want to make any species extinct?
›Reveal solutionSolution
Direct, deliberate human-caused extinction is mostly driven by commercial over-exploitation and the elimination of species considered undesirable.
While habitat loss is the single biggest overall cause of extinction, humans also deliberately drive species to extinction through:
- Over-exploitation for economic/commercial gain — hunting and poaching for meat, fur, skin, ivory, horns, or use in traditional medicine (e.g., the extinction of the Steller's sea cow, near-extinction of tigers and rhinos for their body parts).
- Elimination of perceived competitors, pests, or predators — killing carnivores/predators that threaten livestock, or species seen as agricultural pests, to protect human economic interests. …
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