Should the habitat of plants and animals be preserved even if it means slowing development of cities,businesses, housing projects or the economy??

i think that it would be a good but bad thing so both because think about it we already have an economy problem its not gonna make it any worse because the less stuff we build the better we need to save money and atleast try to help the animals and plants but it does leave less places for people to live and then people end up homeless. or the fact that if people are so crowed that diseases would be spred so quickly and plus we depend on other species so with out them there wouldnt be an us