Question

. Distinguish between gross primary productivity and net primary productivity. Explain how net primary productivity affects the number of consumers in an ecosystem and on the earth. List two of the most productive ecosystems or aquatic life zones and two of the least productive ecosystems or aquatic life zones. Use the concept of net primary productivity to explain why harvesting plants from estuaries, clearing tropical forests to grow crops, and harvesting the primary producers in oceans to feed the human population are not good ideas.

Answer 1

Answer and Explanation:

The gross primary productivity corresponds to the sum of all the energy produced by the plants (primary producers) during the photosynthesis process. The net primary productivity, corresponds to the gross primary productivity value, even the energy value used by the plants in the metabolic processes that they present, in this way, we can conclude that the net primary productivity is the energy that is available for the living beings that consume the vegetias.

The ecosystems with the highest level of productivity are those that have a large number of vegetables with full access to the sun, in this case, we can mention forests and ecological parks. On the other hand, ecosystems with lower levels of productivity are those with a low number of plants, such as cities and areas with deforestation.

Because of our need to consume energy from net primary productivity, we are constantly harvesting vegetables and some photosynthetic water products to use in our food. However, this causes us to remove vegetables from nature and decrease the amount of gross primary productivity that ecosystems would have, and, consequently, decreasing the amount of net primary productivity that we need so much.