Natural resources knowledge shrinks as economies grow:ES&T Online News:

Natural resources knowledge shrinks as economies grow
New research shows that Indonesians can identify 71% of local plants when asked, while the British can name only 24%.

Most people realize that as a society becomes more industrialized, individual knowledge about the natural world diminishes. New research published in ES&T (DOI: 10.1021/es070837v) analyzes interviews done with various age groups living in Indonesia, India, and the U.K. to find out how much ecological knowledge is lost, when it is lost, and how that loss affects society's ability to manage natural resources as industrialization occurs. The findings indicate that future efforts to conserve biodiversity on a global scale are at great risk.

http://pubs.acs.org/subscribe/journals/esthag-w/2008/jan/policy/cc_ecoknowledge.html ---