SUMMER often sharpens our awareness of nature. So many aspects of the natural world draw the senses at this time of year: blue skies possessing an inner glow, the complex scents of plants, the majesty of trees in full leaf. At such moments you realise how much we are a part of nature – indeed, that it is where we truly belong.

However, a recent report pooling data and expertise from more than 50 nature conservation and research organisations, State of Nature 2016, makes alarming reading. Above all, it questions our custodianship of the natural world in the UK.

Of course, there are far worse offenders on the planet than Britain when it comes to destroying entire habitats: for example, felling huge areas of rain forest in the Amazon or Madagascar. Nevertheless, the statistics for the British countryside speak for themselves.

Over a quarter of all British birds are under threat, with eight species almost extinct. Three-quarters of all flying insects have disappeared since 1945, including a staggering 60 different kinds of moth. Orchid varieties have shrunk by half and two species are gone forever.

The report also revealed that 40 per cent of all species are in moderate or steep decline. Over a quarter of the hedgehog population has disappeared in a decade and toads are down 68 per cent in 30 years, with water voles no longer found in 94 per cent of the places where they once lived. The list goes depressingly on. Mountain hares are in steep decline, as are rabbits, and even the wily and adaptable fox has lost over 40 per cent of its population.

On a positive note the loss of hedgerows has halted, from a low point where nine kilometres were being dug up every day until the mid-1990s. Nevertheless, the State of Nature 2016 report described Britain as being “among the most nature-depleted countries in the world”.

Of course, at the heart of the problem lies our society’s attitude to food and the farming practices that result from it. The emphasis is always on profit and efficiency of production, whether we’re talking fauna, flora or the ruthless exploitation of flesh and field.

The State of Nature 2016 report warns that “The intensification of agriculture has had the biggest impact on wildlife, and this has been overwhelmingly negative … farming has changed dramatically, with new technologies boosting yields often at the expense of nature.” The new technologies in question include artificial fertilisers, herbicides, pesticides and insecticides, all used unsparingly since the Second World War to maximise food production at the expense of nature. As for factory farming of sentient animals, two words sum it up: horribly cruel.

Yet Britain is full of paradoxes when it comes to food. UK households binned £13 billion worth of food in 2015 that could have been eaten, according to the waste and recycling advisory body Wrap. An estimated 7.3 million tonnes of household food waste was thrown away in 2015 – up from seven million tonnes in 2012. Of that, 4.4 million tonnes were deemed to be “avoidable” waste that was edible at some point before it was put in the bin. At the same time hundreds of thousands of our fellow citizens have been forced by welfare cuts to rely on food banks.

What is to be done in such a situation? Fortunately, even our fracking-friendly government seems to be waking up at last to the scale of the environmental challenges we face. In January 2018 they published A Green Future: Our 25 Year Plan to Improve the Environment with bold targets on air and water quality, and protection for threatened plants and wildlife.

Given that the government has failed to deliver on so many of its manifesto promises we must wait to see if, on this issue, words will be matched with deeds.

One thing is certain: preserving our natural heritage must be an urgent priority for all political parties. Especially given that the Brexit process, if handled badly, could threaten many of our EU-inspired environmental safeguards. Change in this regard must begin locally, nationally and internationally, but above all, it must start now. We owe nothing less to ourselves and all living things in the brief summers of our lives.