Representational.
Geneva: Around a third of species of fungi are at risk of extinction threats like deforestation and agricultural expansion, an international conservation group-run assessment found. The latest 'Red List' of threatened species showed it on Thursday, Reuters reported.
Fungi play a key role in a range of functions, from decomposition to mammalian digestion to forest regeneration, and are involved in making several powerful medicines, including antibiotics, as well as bread and beer.
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) says that even after the roles of Fungi, such as yeasts, moulds and mushrooms, in life on Earth, they are being overlooked and under-appreciated.
In IUCN's latest 'Red List', which categorises species according to the risks they face, it says that nearly a third, or 411, of the 1,300 species of
Fungi are at risk of extinction.
Caroline Pollock, Senior Programme Coordinator in IUCN's Red List Unit, said that fungi are crucial to all life, and without them, an ecosystem can collapse quickly.
They are best known as mushrooms, but they are just the fruiting bodies of an organism whose bulk is found underground in a large network of root-like "mycelia" structures, Reuters reported.
When there are some 2.5 million fungi species thought to exist, only a fraction of them are formally identified. This means that the assessment of the threats they face has been slow compared to that of flora and fauna. One of the frontline challenges they face is that their habitats are being destroyed by human activities of expansion of urban areas and agricultural lands, IUCN says.
At least the 198 species listed on the Red List are facing extinction because of deforestation, IUCN adds.