Catastrophic reports and publications about the rapid loss of species numbers are becoming increasingly frequent. Furthermore, the biomass of common animal species, such as insects or birds, is also being hotly debated.
In contrast, the loss of plant species and their biomass is much less frequently reported. Does anyone know of well-documented reports or publications on massive local or global plant losses and/or massive plant biomass losses?
I disagree. I searched and found no academic papers outlining rapid or mass loss of animal or plant species. The reports you refer to are anecdotal, editorial, news reports, etc.
You disagree thus also with this (attached) famous paper on insect/insect biomass decline?
Here is one more paper (review) explaining the reasons and consequences of the decline of insects (Goulson 2019 in Current Biology).
I am searching for similar documents on plants.
The contribution of land-use change to global carbon emissions is largely from decline in total global plant biomass (+ soil carbon). Tropical deforestation is the biggest source. For plant species, known extinctions are still low: if there is one individual left it is not extinct and an individual plant can persist much longer than an individual insect. So there hasn't - yet - been a plant apocalypse. Estimates of the proportion of threatened species tend to be in the 20-30% range, but even without action, these potential extinctions will happen slowly. We still can - and certainly should - save all the plants.
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