Most US Endangered Species Money Goes to Handful of Species
Voice of America
FILE - This August 2017 photo provided by the US Fish and Wildlife Service shows a winter-run chinook salmon. FILE - This image released by the US Fish and Wildlife Service shows a flower from a shrub known as marrón bacora on March 21, 2021. FILE - This undated image released by the US Fish and Wildlife Service shows a small lobster-shaped Panama City crayfish.
Since passage of the Endangered Species Act 50 years ago, more than 1,700 plants, mammals, fish, insects and other species in the U.S. have been listed as threatened or endangered with extinction. Yet federal government data reveals striking disparities in how much money is allocated to save various biological kingdoms.
FILE - Part of the temples of Baalbek, a UNESCO world heritage site in Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley, illuminated in blue light, Oct. 24, 2015. FILE - This picture shows closed shops on an empty street in the eastern Lebanese city of Baalbek on Oct. 19, 2024. FILE - People walk near the Roman ruins of Baalbek, Lebanon, Jan. 5, 2024. FILE - A man sits amidst the rubble at a site damaged in the aftermath of an Israeli strike on the town of Al-Ain in the Baalbek region, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, in Lebanon, Nov. 6, 2024.
Dr. Jaafar al Jotheri, shown here Nov. 10, 2024, holds satellite images and explores the site of the Battle of al-Qadisiyah, which was fought in Mesopotamia -- present-day Iraq -- in the 630s AD. A desert area with scattered plots of agricultural land with features that closely matched the description of the al-Qadisiyah battle site described in historic texts, Nov. 10, 2024.