Final answer:
Ecosystems require components like sunlight, producers, consumers, and decomposers to function effectively. These components deliver crucial ecosystem services necessary for the survival of all living things, including humans.
Step-by-step explanation:
For an ecosystem to live longer and thrive, certain elements are essential. These include sunlight or chemical compounds to provide energy, the presence of producers like plants and photosynthetic organisms to harness that energy, and consumers like animals that feed on these producers.
Decomposers such as bacteria and fungi are crucial as they recycle nutrients back into the ecosystem, ensuring that soils remain fertile and productive. Without these key components, and the multitude of services they provide, human life would struggle to exist as ecosystems purify our air and water, stabilize the climate, and support all aspects of biodiversity.
Ecosystem services are the goods and the support systems that sustain human life. This includes production of oxygen, decomposition of waste, regulation of climate, and the creation of soils necessary for agriculture. It is clear that without healthy ecosystems, survival of living things, including humans, would be compromised, as ecosystems are the cornerstone that upholds the intricate web of life on Earth.