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THOSE of us who write about the state of the environment are accustomed to being the bearers of bad news, and it is easy to become numbed by the scale of the destruction. But some stories retain the power to shock. One of them hit me hard a few weeks ago.

A widely reported research paper set out to discover how much of Earth’s land is ecologically intact, meaning that its ecosystem remains in a pristine, pre-industrial state. The answer: just 3 per cent. To frame it differently, in the past 500 years, humans have degraded 97 per cent of the terrestrial biosphere.

There is, I think, only one word for such levels of destruction: ecocide. Like genocide, it isn’t a word to be thrown around casually. But what else does justice to that degree of destruction?

Speaking of justice, that is exactly what some activists would like ecocide to lead to. Their long-standing goal is to have ecocide recognised in international law alongside crimes like genocide.

Those who bring destruction on nature could find themselves at the International Criminal Court (ICC) next to the perpetrators of the most heinous crimes against humanity. This idea has long been on the fringes of environmental activism, but it now has a genuine chance of being written into the statute books.

Like laws for crimes against peace, an ecocide law would trace its roots to wartime atrocities, in this case the annihilation of forests in South-East Asia, first by the UK’s Royal Air Force during the guerrilla war known as the Malayan Emergency and later by the US Air Force in the Vietnam war. In 1970, the destruction inspired Arthur Galston, a plant biologist at Yale University whose PhD research had led to the development of agent orange, to coin the word “ecocide”.

Calls to make ecocide a crime followed these events, though with limited success. The 2002 treaty that created the ICC originally included an ecocide law, but it was scaled back after objections from the UK and US (wilful environmental destruction in wartime is a crime, but .

“A law against ecocide would be a powerful deterrent against environmental destruction. Or would it?”

But campaigners stuck to the task and criminalisation has slowly gathered support. Last year saw a significant breakthrough when two of the ICC’s member states, Vanuatu and the Maldives, asked the court to “seriously consider” criminalising ecocide. President Emmanuel Macron of France has backed their request and the government of Belgium has also indicated support.

An expert legal team convened by the . It aims to publish next month, at which point one or more member states of the ICC could formally propose making ecocide a crime. That would set the ball rolling towards ratification.

The road is long and so are the odds, but I hope the endeavour succeeds. A law against ecocide would be a powerful deterrent against environmental destruction. Or would it? Not everyone in the green camp is sure.

Last month, I hosted a 91av event called . We invited a distinguished panel to answer questions submitted by the audience. One was on whether ecocide should be a crime.

I expected a resounding yes, but didn’t get one. Partha Dasgupta, an economist at the University of Cambridge, said: “It’s something we could aspire to in the future but it’s far too early.” Even though there is a strong philosophical argument in favour, he said, the practical danger is that we get bogged down in legal definitions and end up achieving nothing.

I have great respect for Dasgupta and his answer gives me pause. Making ecocide a crime has enormous instinctive appeal. But as a real-world measure, would it do anything? Pursuing alleged war criminals though the ICC has proved time-consuming and difficult enough. When it comes to ecocide, who would be in the dock?

On reflection, I am still in favour. Such a law would not only seek retribution and deterrence but also draw moral red lines. Yes, securing convictions for crimes against peace has proven difficult, but nobody can be left in any doubt that those crimes are totally beyond the pale. The biosphere deserves the same moral status.

I will leave the last word to Polly Higgins, a barrister who gave up a career in corporate law to become one of the most effective backers for criminalising ecocide. As she , “For now, in law outside of wartime, it is not a crime to cause mass destruction or loss of ecosystems. Our world has normalized… ecocide”.

Higgins died in 2019 with her mission unaccomplished, but the dream didn’t die with her. We need a new norm, and establishing that ecocide is among the most serious crimes there is would be a just way of achieving it.