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The trend is to reduce personal resource consumption. But it's only half the solution and the other half has faded from prominence - that is the need to end population growth. This received a good deal of press in the 1970s, but since then, it's become a taboo subject. Pressure from groups who saw the population issue as a distraction from their preferred causes saw to that. Over a decade ago an article by John Holdren shows us precisely what determines our total energy consumption. It says total energy consumption, equals population size times the average per capita energy use. So if E * total energy use, P * population size, and e * energy use per capita, we can say E * P x e. It means we have little chance of tackling our energy and environmental challenges if we ignore both per capita consumption and population. Today's "ecological footprint" measure is an elaboration of Holdren's equation. The equation above shows comparing population growth to the growth in total energy or resource use is to compare one factor in the equation to the product. In the US, per capita consumption is higher than in developing countries. Holdren's equation tells us it's never wise to ignore either population or per person consumption. With regard to oil use, for example, adding one person to the US population is like adding about 15 in China. Ignoring population growth in the US is perilous. Solutions include programs to reduce unplanned pregnancies, lowering fertility rates to the sub-replacement levels and assistance to Mexico to improve economic opportunities so they're not forced to come to the U.S. to earn a subsistence wage. Consumption levels in the developing world are growing fast, in line with economic growth. Without attention to population, rising per capita consumption multiplied by large and growing populations puts the Third World on a course toward disaster. We can assist with humane programs to hasten lowering fertility rates. Developing countries need to increase girls' educational opportunities and women's economic and health care options. They must increase family planning services and improve child survival rates. Having overshot the earth's capacity to sustain our current numbers, we must act now to avert catastrophe. If we fail to reduce both per capita consumption and to halt the growth of our population no new technology will prevent an unimaginable loss of life.

Our civilization is being squeezed between advancing deserts and rising seas. Mounting population densities, once generated by the addition of over 70 million people per year, are now also fueled by the advance of deserts and the rise in sea level. Expanding deserts are primarily the result of overstocking grasslands and overplowing land. Rising seas result from temperature increases from the burning of fossil fuels. China is losing productive land at an accelerating rate. From 1950 to 1975 China lost an average of 600 square miles to desert each year. By 2000, 1,400 square miles were going to desert annually. Satellite images show two deserts in north-central China expanding and merging to form a single, larger desert overlapping Inner Mongolia and Gansu provinces. To the west in Xinjiang Province, two even larger deserts--the Taklimakan and Kumtag--are also heading for a merger. Further east, the Gobi Desert is within 150 miles of Beijing. Chinese scientists report that over the last half-century, 24,000 villages in northern and western China were abandoned as they were overrun by drifting sand. Kazakhstan, site of the vast Soviet Virgin Lands Project, has abandoned nearly half of its cropland since 1980. In Afghanistan, with a population of 31 million, the Registan Desert is encroaching on agricultural areas. A UNEP team reports that up to 100 villages have been submerged by windblown dust and sand. In the northwest, sand dunes are moving onto agricultural land, from the loss of stabilizing vegetation due to firewood gathering and overgrazing. Iran, which has 70 million people and 80 million goats and sheep, is losing its battle with the desert. In 2002 sand storms buried 124 villages in the southeastern province forcing their abandonment. Drifting sands had covered grazing areas, starving livestock and depriving villagers of their livelihood. The Sahara Desert is pushing the populations of Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria northward toward the Mediterranean. In countries from Senegal and Mauritania in the west to Sudan, Ethiopia, and Somalia in the east, the demands of growing human and livestock numbers are converting land into desert. Nigeria is losing 1,355 square miles to desertification each year. While Nigeria's human population grew from 33 million in 1950 to 134 million in 2006, its livestock population grew from 6 million to 66 million. The food needs forced the plowing of marginal land and the forage needs of livestock exceeded the carrying capacity of its grasslands. Nigeria's population is being squeezed into an ever-smaller area. In Mexico, the degradation of cropland forces some 700,000 Mexicans off the land each year in search of jobs in nearby cities or in the United States. Rising seas promise to displace greater numbers in the future. During the twentieth century, sea level rose by 6 inches. During this century seas may rise by 4 to 35 inches. Since 2001, record-high temperatures have accelerated ice melting making it likely that the future rise in sea level will be even greater. If the Greenland ice sheet, a mile thick in some places, were to melt entirely it would raise sea level by 23 feet, or 7 meters. A one-meter rise would inundate many of the rice-growing river deltas and floodplains of India, Thailand, Viet Nam, Indonesia, and China. A one-meter rise in sea level would cause some 30 million Bangladeshis to migrate, internally or to other countries. Hundreds of cities would be at least partly inundated, including London, Alexandria, and Bangkok. More than a third of Shanghai, would be under water. A one-meter rise combined with a 50-year storm surge would leave large portions of Lower Manhattan and the National Mall in Washington, D.C., flooded. If the Greenland ice sheet should melt, it would force the abandonment of thousands of coastal cities and communities. Rising seas and desertification will present the world with an unprecedented flow of environmental refugees and the potential for civil strife. We must deal with rapid population growth, advancing deserts, and rising seas. Growth in the human population is accompanied by a growth of livestock populations of more than 35 million per year. The rising concentrations of carbon dioxide that are destabilizing the earth's climate are driven by the burning of fossil fuels. Reverse these trends or risk being overwhelmed by them.

The Population Reference Bureau's latest projections show that by 2025, Uganda's population will almost double to 56 million, and in 44 years its numbers will grow by nearly as many as China's. In Uganda more than a third of all women say they would like to stop or delay having children, but reproductive health experts say a lack of information and female contraceptives plays a major role. Donors must share in the blame, said the International Planned Parenthood Federation. Donors have shifted their focus to HIV and nobody is talking about it any more. Population is off the development agenda and that's a tragedy for Africa.

The population of the US is projected to reach 300 million by October - a population growth rate comparable to that of China. Because of immigration, the number of people in the US could reach 400 million by 2050. About 76 million people are being added annually. This year's world grain harvest will fall short of consumption by 61 million tons. That's the sixth time in the past seven years that production has failed to satisfy demand. The world carry-over stocks of grain will fall to 57 days of consumption by the end of this year, the shortest buffer since a 56-day-low in 1956 doubled grain prices. Despite continued growth in world food output, the developing world had 815 million hungry people in 2002, 9 million less than in 1990. Population pressure in Mexico, Central America, and elsewhere has encouraged the flood of illegal immigrants in the US. Warren Buffett recognized population-related problems in announcing last week plans to donate $37.4 billion of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. stock to several foundations including some he's created that emphasize family planning, abortion rights, environmental and conservation issues, and education for low-income children. Human beings are similar to other animals. As food availability increases, the population will grow. And some animals regulate their fertility if food gets scarce. In the case of humans, there must be recognition that population growth is a function of increases in food availability. Otherwise, increased disease and death rates may ultimately control population growth. Other factors will brake population growth, including environmental changes, resource restraints, and a decline in the quality of life. World oil output is predicted to peak within 15 years. Fresh water in some areas is in short supply. Farmland is being chewed up by suburbia. Global warming will force hundreds of millions of people out of coastal regions in the next century or so. One way to boost the world's food supply would be if people ate more grains and vegetables and less meat, the world could then feed another billion people. The average American consumes 20 times as much in natural resources as the average African and if all the people consumed at the level of high-income countries, the planet could support only 1.8 billion people, not the actual 6.5 billion. It is doubtful if measures to encourage family planning will restrain the world's population. Leaders must come up with intelligent, creative, inventive measures to discourage births. Every 11 seconds another person is added to the US population.

As many as 400 million people are at risk of starvation because of drought and crop failure. Britain will face flooding through increased rainfall and parts of the coastline could be washed away by rising seas. Saving the environment is a top priority. The US has 5% of the world's population but accounts for nearly a quarter of global emissions. Blair and Bush must act now to save the planet for future generations.

Why Population Matters News Y6B: 6 Billion Reasons Sustainability Carrying Capacity Overconsumption Environmental Impacts Facts Impacts in the News

Though more than two-thirds of the planet is covered with water, only a small fraction'"around 0.3 percent'"is available for human use and reuse. And no more of this renewable fresh water is available today than existed at the dawn of human civilization.  

World population, currently 6.5 billion, is growing by another 76 million people per year. According to the UN the world will add another 2.6 billion people by 2050. Rapid population growth has placed incredible stress on Earth's resources. Global demand for water has tripled since the 1950s, but the supply of fresh drinking water has been declining because of over-pumping and contamination. Half a billion people live in water-stressed or water-scarce countries, and by 2025 that number will grow to three billion. In the last 50 years, cropland has been reduced by 13% and pasture by 4%.   June 2005   U.N.

Population Growth and the Environment.   The rate of human population growth peaked around 1963, but the number of people living on Earth, and sharing finite resources has topped out at over 6.6 billion today. Human population is expected to exceed nine billion by 2050. Many if not all of the environmental problems are either caused or exacerbated by population growth. Trends such as the loss of the planet's forests, the depletion of fisheries, and the alteration of atmosphere and climate are related to the fact that human population expanded from millions in prehistoric times to over six billion today. Population growth is behind the clearing of 80% of rainforests, the loss of plant and wildlife species, an increase in greenhouse gas emissions, and the development of about half of the Earth's land surface. Half of the world's population will be exposed to water-scarce conditions and difficulties in meeting…consumption levels. In less developed countries, lack of access to birth control, as well as cultural traditions encourage women to have babies, and lead to rapid population growth. The result is an increasing number of poor people suffering from malnourishment, lack of clean water, overcrowding and inadequate shelter, and AIDS and other diseases. While population numbers in developed nations are leveling off or diminishing, high levels of consumption make for a huge drain on resources. As more residents of developing countries get access to Western media, or immigrate to the U.S., they want to emulate the consumption-heavy lifestyles. Environmentalists consider the support of the Global Gag Rule to be shortsighted, and that support for family planning is the most effective way to check population growth and relieve pressure on the planet's environment.   January 08, 2008   www.HealthNewsDigest.com

India Heading for 2 Billion Population.   India's population will almost certainly be near 1.8 billion by 2050 and could top 2 billion by the end of this century unless fertility rates decline more rapidly in India's largest and poorest states. The possibility of India becoming the only country ever to have 2 billion people depends on the course of events in each of India 35 states and Union territories. India passed the 1 billion population benchmark in 2000, and stood at 1.1 billion in 2007. The government has been concerned about population growth outpacing economic growth, and India was the first country to adopt a policy to slow population growth. Since the policy was first stated in 1952, the country's total fertility rate has declined from about six children per woman to about three, but fertility levels vary greatly throughout India. The decline has been greater in its southern states, which have much higher rates of literacy and education. The southern states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu now have TFRs below two children per woman. The large states of the north, the "Hindi Belt," are where about 40% of Indians live. Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, with about 93 million and 188 million people, currently have a TFR of about 4.3 children per woman. The state and Union territory populations were projected under two scenarios. One assumed that states with a current TFR above "two children" would decrease to 2.1 and then remain constant. The other assumed the TFR decline would continue until it reached 1.85 children per woman. The first scenario results in a population that would reach two billion in 2066-2071. By 2101, four states, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh would account for almost half of the country's population. Scenario B does not reach two billion, growth peaks in 2081-2086, after which it decreases. This state-based projection series uses national fertility rates and age structures, and PRB (Population Reference Bureau) believes it provides a more realistic scenario. The population projected for Uttar Pradesh ranges from 353 million to 364 million by 2051, and between 414 million and 480 million by 2101. The projected 2101 total for India ranges from 1.9 billion to 2.2 billion, depending on the assumptions for each state.   January 02, 2008   People and Planet website

Cities, Megacities, and the Price of Oil.   An urban poor person needs one or two dollars to buy everything he or she needs: shelter, food, fuel, medicines, clothes, transport, even taxes. But a rural poor person with a piece of land may be much better off in that their land, which may provide food, perhaps fuel, and shelter. Their monetary income may be additional to their basic needs. This is why land reform is more important than aid to poor countries, why a standpipe or irrigation system is better than encouraging a move to the city. But people vote in cities, pay taxes, are easier to monitor and control. Its cheaper to provide healthcare and education, businesses have the critical mass to survive. One of the aims of taxation is to force workers into a society which produces surplus, rather than self-sufficiency which cannot support a ruling class. Poor city-societies are vulnerable and require imports of energy and food, which must be paid for with the profit from commerce. In poorer countries that means trading of the country's natural wealth. That is the 'profit' that pays for everything else. But the main activity of the city may be government administration, tax collecting and all the paraphernalia we are familiar with. As energy prices rise and food prices double, poorer cities suffer most, because energy and food are their unavoidable imports. Poor self-sufficient people with their own land are largely unaffected. If we want to aid the people of a poor country, then land reform, provision of basic tools, water supply, non-hybrid seeds and harvest storage are best for the people.
Karen Gaia says: This opinion piece ignores the impacts of overpopulation on agricultural land. When the number of children that survive childhood expands from 2 per family to 4 or 6 (due to better sanitation and health practices), the multiplication of people upon the land forces migration of the excess younger people to the cities.   February 15, 2008   Donal Seeking blog

Niger: Population Explosion Threatens Development Gains.   If Nigeriens remain uninformed about family planning and keep reproducing at the current rate the population will more than quadruple by 2050, imposing unmanageable demands on the economy, social services and the environment. The current rate of population growth is 3.3% every year. If that growth continues, there will be 56 million people in Niger by 2050, compared to 13.5 million today. In 1960, it was just 1.7 million. The average number of children per mother is 7.1. Women said they would like nine and men said 12, but some families said 40 or 50 children. It a society that encourages procreation. Just 5% of Nigeriens use family planning and contraception. People aren't informed about the negative consequences of having so many children. The 85% of Nigeriens who rely on rain-fed, subsistence agriculture to feed themselves are going to be hardest hit as millions more people compete for the same amount of farmland to grow food. The Sahel has recently been identified as one of the regions most likely to be adversely affected by climate change. The increase in the population will continue to accentuate the cereal production and wood-for-fuel deficits which started in the 1980s. Niger's population will quickly overtake the government's ability to provide health, education, jobs and even water points, tasks that it is already failing at today. 94% of Nigeriens live on 35% of the land. The most populated areas are along the southern border with Burkina Faso and Mali. The Maradi region holds 20% of the population, 2,235,748 people, living on 3.3% of the country's land. Niger's desert and mountain north accounts for 53% of Niger's territory but only 3 percent of the population, 321,639 people. Niger plans this year to curb population growth which the INS says would reduce the population in 2050 to 33.3 million, still almost three times its current level. The government wants the number practising family planning to increase from to 15% or 20% by 2015. The INS says 20% of women claim to want it. The plan calls for information campaigns to educate religious leaders and women about the availability and importance of family planning. Currently, every second girl is married and likely to be procreating before the age of 15. Raising the marriage age to 18 would take up to four years off a woman's reproductive life. By 2015 population growth should have slowed to 2.5% and the average number of children per woman should be five. Diadi Boureima, deputy representative of the UN Fund for Population Affairs (UNFPA) in Niger, said the task was a critical one. If the demographics continue, Niger cannot develop. All the resources the country has will be going into social services and nothing will be left for investing in the economy. The government is acting accordingly.   December 11, 2007   UN Integrated Regional Information Network

Australia: Do We Need a Population Policy?.   Australia experienced an annual population growth rate of 1.5% for the year ending September 2007. The increase of 318,500 people saw Australia's population rise to 21,097,000. People are ready to grasp the argument that the unsustainable growth in population numbers is degrading our planet and that Australia must begin to think of itself as a country with a population problem. Any Australian population policy must recognise that the Australian economy is strongly inter-linked with the global economy. We can feed 25 million people without irreparable damage to our resources. All population growth - or even stationary population - does something to change the environment. If Australia is to become purely pantheistic and turn its back on the achievements and arts of civilisation, we have much to lose. Population increases from immigration should, be limited to maintain social and political stability. The cost of housing is soaring and rents are predicted to rise by 50% in the next four years. There are water restrictions on many of our major cities and our rivers are running dry, but still we keep the immigrants pouring in. If we are to meet our green house gas commitments we cannot keep on growing our population. It is high time we decided just what is the optimum population level for Australia.   April 04, 2008   Webdiary

Australia: Biofuel Bill Should Not Proceed.   Australian population grew 1.5% for the year ending September 2007. The increase saw Australia's population rise to 21,097,000. People grasp the argument that the unsustainable growth in population numbers is degrading our planet and that Australia must begin to think of itself as a country with a population problem. The human population on the Earth cannot continue to grow without destroying our life-support systems. The Australian economy is inter-linked with the global economy. We export to many other countries. It is by no means certain that controlling the Australian population will preserve our environment. We can feed 25 million people without damage to our resources. All population growth, or even stationary population, does something to change the environment. If Australia is to turn its back on the achievements and arts of civilisation, we have much to lose. The shutting of the immigration gates would prevent enrichment of our society. Population increases from immigration should be limited to maintain stability. A large immigration from countries with different cultural backgrounds would risk divisiveness as seen in other countries. The cost of housing is soaring and rents are predicted to rise by 50% in the next four years largely due to the large number of migrants coming to Australia. There are water restrictions on many of our major cities and our rivers are running dry, but still we keep the immigrants pouring in. If we are to meet our green house gas commitments we cannot keep on growing our population.   April 03, 2008   Scoop.co.nz

U.S.: Numbers Count in the Immigration Debate.   Immigrants, like native-born Americans, are good people, hard-working and patriotic. Individual immigrants are not problematic; mass immigration, both legal and illegal, is. Mass immigration is ruining the quality of life for the children and grandchildren of immigrants already in the United States. It is chewing up what little open space remains, driving up air-and water-pollution, amplifying suburban sprawl and placing a larger burden on publicly financed institutions. Most public debate ignores that immigration, both legal and illegal, has ballooned to record levels since the early 1990s. The number of foreign-born people in the US has reached 37 million. The most recent mass immigration, takes place when US population levels belabor and deplete the nation's natural resources. At least half of the 10.3 million immigrants who have arrived since 2000 are illegal. About 47% of all immigrants and their young children are on Medicaid or are uninsured. Nearly 33% of immigrant-headed households use at least one welfare program compared with 19% for natives. It is food assistance and Medicaid that explain the numbers. On the plus side, 82% of immigrant households have at least one worker in the household, compared with just 73% of native households. In fact, 78% of immigrant households using the major welfare programs have at least one worker. The public debate over immigration ignores the huge bubble of immigration the United States is now experiencing. It also ignores, the environmental impact of mass immigration. The CIS describes its mission seeks fewer immigrants but a warmer welcome for those admitted. If we want the US to become one nonstop mass of urban sprawl, we should continue to allow record levels of legal and illegal immigration. If we care about the quality of our environment and the quality of life here, we should take note of the numbers.
Karen Gaia: My issue with this article is that it does not seem concerned with the future sustainability of the U.S. It mentions Medicaid, food assistance, and immigrants, but if the author were truly interested in sustainability due to population, it would advocate: 1) fewer children to native born and immigrant alike (we have a large number of unwanted pregnancies), 2) a big cut in consumption by native born and immigrant alike, and 3) public policies and planning that help (not coerce) people to achieve numbers 1 and 2.   November 30, 2007   SignOnSanDiego.com

Uganda: Doctors Demand More Midwives.   Uganda will need to reduce its maternal mortality rate from 435 to 131 deaths per 100,000 if it is to meet this MDG by 2015. A high fertility rate at 6.7 births per woman is given as a contributing factor. The high fertility rates cause challenges which make access to quality maternal care difficult besides straining the health facilities to manage various health complications. The levels of literacy are low and it takes more time for people to understand the benefits of family planning. The government has not been such an active partner in regard to population control matters and a small percentage of the health budget has been allocated to issues of reproductive health. The quality of education is poor. The high rate of UPE enrollment is mainly a result of Uganda's high population. As the country's population soars, there is more need to increase access to health care facilities and improve health service delivery. The failure to be on course towards the attainment of the MDGs has been blamed on the country's high population growth, inefficiency in the management of the social budget and inadequacy of resources which is related to the demands of a high population which makes it difficult to apportion resources out of a limited resource like that of Uganda. A population growth rate of about 3.5% per annum could make achievement of many MDGs impossible.   February 19, 2008   Africa News Service

Growth of UK Population is Unsustainable, Says Cameron.   In his first speech on immigration and population, the Conservative leader will attack Gordon Brown for failing to tackle the causes of Britain's growing demographic problems. He will call for a "grown-up conversation" about population growth. Britain's population is set to rise by nine million over the next 20 years, because of higher life expectancy and higher immigration. He will say that we need to reduce the level of net immigration and the pressure of household formation. He will call for an understanding of the challenge, as well as action to ensure that the population grows sustainably. We need to bring policy on housing, skills immigration control, the family, border control, into a coherent long-term population strategy. In the past 40 years, the population grew by about six million. Over the next 40 years it is expected to grow more than twice as fast. The country faces a choice. We have to get used to it or most importantly, we will also make clear how our approach joins up and fits together into a coherent long-term strategy.   October 29, 2007   The Times

Humanity is the Greatest Challenge.   The growth in human population and rising consumption has exceeded the planet's ability to support us. We face two problems of importance. The first is our global ecological plight. The second is our difficulty acknowledging the first. Environmental writers remain reluctant to discuss the severity of the global dilemma we've created. There is an alarm to sound and the time for reticence is over. We've outgrown the planet and need radical action to avert unspeakable consequences. From deforestation to collapsing fisheries, desertification, the global spread of chemical toxins, ocean dead zones, and the death of coral reefs, an array of interrelated declines is evidence of our impact. The depletion of resources such as oil and ground-water, shows the challenge upon us. Barring decisive action, we are marching toward global collapse. Humans are not exempt from the threats posed by ecological degradation. Climate change-induced drought and the depletion of oil and aquifers could trigger famine on an unprecedented scale. Billions could die. At the very least, we risk our children inheriting a world empty of the richness of life we take for granted. The most worrisome is the convergence in time of so many serious problems. Issues such as oil and aquifer depletion and climate change are set to reach crisis points within decades. As a result of their interdependence, the extinction of species can trigger cascade effects. We're out of our league, influencing systems we don't understand. Some conclude we've postponed action too long to avoid massive upheaval and the best we can do now is to soften the blow. One thing is certain: continued inaction will be of no help - we're at a turning point in human history. Though few seem willing to confront the facts, we simply went too far. The growth which once measured our species' success has inevitably turned deadly. Our numbers and levels of consumption having exceeded the Earth's capacity to sustain us for the long-term. Inevitably, our numbers will come down, whether voluntarily or through such natural means as famine or disease. It's imperative we reduce consumption. We need a transition to clean, renewable energy. But abundant clean energy alone will not end our problems. There remains population growth which increases consumption of resources. On a finite planet, the physical component of economic growth cannot continue forever. It has gone too far already. As a promising alternative, the field of ecological economics offers the "steady state economy". We must end world population growth, then reduce population size. But today's environmentalists avoid the subject more than any other ecological truth. Their motives range from the political to a misunderstanding of the issue. Neither justifies hiding the truth because total resource use is the product of population size and per capita consumption. Expert consensus tells us we can address population humanely by solving the social problems that fuel it. Let's make the effort for today's and tomorrow's children.   January 13, 2008   BBC Green Room

Economic Collapse and Global Ecology.   Given failure to pursue policies to reverse deterioration of the biosphere and avoid ecological collapse, the best we can hope for may be that the growth-based economic system crashes. The Earth is faced with a conundrum, climate policies enjoy support only in times of rapid economic growth. Yet this growth is the primary factor driving environmental ills. The growth machine has pushed the planet well beyond its ecological carrying capacity. With every economic downturn, it becomes less likely that policies to ensure global sustainability will be embraced. This explores the possibility that it would be better for the economic collapse to come now rather than later. Economic growth is a deadly disease with capitalism as its most virulent strain. Throw-away consumption and explosive population growth are made possible by using up fossil fuels and destroying ecosystems. Humanity has proved unwilling to address environmental threats with haste and ambition. Action could be taken now at net benefit to the economy. Yet, the losers primarily fossil fuel industries resist futures not dependent upon their deadly products. Perpetual economic growth, and necessary climate and other ecological policies, are incompatible. Global ecological sustainability depends critically upon establishing a steady state economy. Industries like coal and natural forest logging will be eliminated even as new opportunities emerge in solar energy and environmental restoration. This transition to economic and ecological sustainability is not happening. The challenge is how to carry out environmental policies even as economic growth ends and consumption plunges. The response is going to be liquidation of even more life-giving ecosystems, and jettisoning of climate policies, to vainly try to maintain high growth and personal consumption. If efforts to reduce emissions and move to a steady state economy fail; the collapse of ecological, economic and social systems is assured. Greens take the continued existence of a habitable Earth with viable, sustainable populations of all species including humans as the ultimate truth and the meaning of life. Whether this is possible in a time of economic collapse is crucially dependent upon whether enough ecosystems and resources remain post collapse to allow humanity to recover and reconstitute sustainable, relocalized societies. It may be better for humanity's future that economic collapse comes sooner rather than later, while more ecosystems and opportunities to return to nature's fold exist. Economic collapse will be deeply wrenching part Great Depression, part African famine. There will be starvation and civil strife, and a long period of suffering and turmoil. Many will be killed as balance returns to the Earth. Most people have forgotten how to grow food and that their identity is more than what they own. Yet those who have lived most lightly upon the land will have an easier time of it, even as those super-consumers living in massive cities finally learn where their food comes from and that ecology is the meaning of life. Economic collapse now means humanity and the Earth ultimately survive to prosper again. Human suffering is inevitable given the degree to which the planet's carrying capacity has been exceeded. Humanity can take the bitter medicine now, and recover while emerging better for it; or our total collapse can be a final, fatal death swoon. A successful response would focus upon bringing down the Earth's industrial economy now. Maybe the best strategy to achieve global ecological sustainability is economic sabotage to hasten the day. It is more fragile than it looks. It is not yet known whether humanity is able to adapt, to ensure survival. If she can, all futures of economic, social and ecological collapse can be avoided. If not it is better that the economic growth machine collapse now, offering hope for a planetary and human revival. I wish no harm to anyone, and want desperately to avoid these prophesies. I speak for the Earth, for despite being the giver of life, her natural voice remains largely unheard over the tumult of the end of being.
Ralph says: Another piece of compulsory reading!!   January 15, 2008   CounterCurrents.org

U.S.: Envisioning a Sustainable Chesapeake.   It's been most inspiring to see discussions begin to address the future of Maryland and the Chesapeake Bay. They prompt us to ask: "What does a sustainable Chesapeake really mean?" My vision is built upon a balanced, vibrant ecosystem teeming with fish, shellfish, underwater grasses and clear, healthy waters. But to be truly sustainable, the Chesapeake ecosystem needs to exist while also supporting the region's human population. Creating a sustainable Chesapeake will not be easy. But as we look around the state, we're seeing more and more positive steps being taken. Recently, the Maryland Commission on Climate Change made recommendations aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions and conserving energy throughout the state. These actions will require that we reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by more than 25% within the next 12 years. An initiative was introduced that will seek to instill a sense of environmental stewardship among the 28,000 students graduating each year. It will also foster research and prepare the new "green" workforce. By changing our own actions, each of us has the ability to reduce our impact on the bay and the planet. As long as the region's population continues to grow, and we develop lands faster than needed to accommodate that growth, we make it more difficult to maintain the sustainability equation. We have struggled more than 20 years to reduce the amount of pollution flowing into the bay and we are still far from where we need to be. Another 10, 20 or 30 years of pollution-fighting efforts will still not be enough. Bay restoration efforts will be needed in perpetuity. We need to manage for sustainability by remaining aware of what will cross our path in the future.
Karen Gaia says: The way things are going, we will be forced to reduce our greenhouse gases because we have passed peak oil, meaning our consumption of oil will be reduced.   February 17, 2008   Annapolis Capital

Let's Change Direction on Human Population: Next Added 100 Million Americans.   This planet ain't big enough for the 6,500,000,000 humans. If you visit www.populationmedia.org, you'll see how fast human numbers explode across the planet on a minute by minute basis. The human race stands nostril-deep in trouble. Behind the climate crisis lies a global issue that no one wants to tackle: do we need radical plans to reduce the world's population? Global birth rates versus death rates is governed by the difference between an inflow and an outflow, and even small imbalances can have large effects. But population growth is almost entirely ignored. Which is odd, since it is at the root of the environmental crisis, and it represents a danger to health and socioeconomic development. For most of the two million years of human history, the population was less than a quarter of a million. Agriculture led to a sustained increase, but it took until 1800 before the planet was host to a billion humans. Today's grand total is estimated to be 6.6 billion, with a growth rate of 80 million each year Impressive increases in the food supply have played a part, but the underlying driver has been the shift from a society, in which energy was drawn from the wind, water, beasts of burden and wood, to a fossil fuel-based world in which most of our energy is obtained by burning coal, oil and gas. This transition has fuelled the changes in quality of life associated with modern technology. Although unevenly distributed, these bounties have seen life expectancy double and a corresponding reduction in mortality rates. But has not been matched by a lowering of the birth rate and this has resulted in the dramatic increase in the human stock. Since every individual can produce many offspring, the process will only cease when something happens to bring birth rate and death rate into balance. The overall growth rate of the world's population hit a peak of about 2% per year in the late sixties and has since fallen to 1.3%. As living standards rise and health conditions improve, the mortality rate decreases. The resulting difference between the numbers of births and deaths causes the population to increase. Eventually, the birth rate decreases until a new balance is achieved and the population again stabilizes, but at a new and higher level. Worldwide, the birth rate is about six per second, and the death rate stands at three per second. UN figures foresee numbers leveling out at a point when we have between 8 and 10 billion humans by 2050 - that's roughly a 50% increase on today's figure. Even at current levels, the WHO reports that more than three billion people are malnourished. Food availability continues to grow, but per capita grain availability has been declining since the eighties. 50% of plants and animals are harvested for our use, creating a huge impact on the world's ecosystems. It is the airborne waste from our energy production that is driving climate change. Yet, population control is rarely discussed. Today, however, publication of a new report by the United Nations Environment Program could be the spur we need. "If debate is started, some will say that we need to stop the world's population booming, and to do so most urgently where the birth rates are highest - the developing world. Programs that seek to reduce birth rates find that three conditions must be met. Birth control must be within the scope of conscious choice, there must be advantages to having a smaller family, if no provision is made for peoples' old age, the incentive is to have more children. The means of control must be available and socially acceptable, combined with education and emancipation of girls and women." The human multitude could only be sustained on a planet 25% larger than our own. But by avoiding a fraction of the projected population increase, the emissions savings could be significant and would be at a cost that would be as little as one-thousandth of the technological fixes. If we believe that the size of the human footprint is a serious problem then a rational view would be that along with a raft of measures to reduce the footprint per person, the issue of population management must be addressed. So controversial is the subject that it has become the Cinderella of the great sustainability debate. In meetings addressing how the planet functions as an integrated whole, demographers and population specialists are notable by their absence. As time passes, so our ability to leave the world in a better state is reduced. Today's report from the UN provides an opportunity to raise the debate once again. For the sake of future generations, I hope that others will this time take up the challenge. My best guess? The US continues on the same path as China, India, Bangladesh, Mexico, Africa and the rest of them until our misery exceeds our ability to continue growing. Unfortunately, by that time, it will be awfully ugly.   February 09, 2008   OpEdNews

Global Over-Population is the Real Issue.   The fertility of the human race: we are getting to the point where you simply can't discuss it, and we are thereby refusing to say anything sensible about the biggest single challenge facing the Earth. The primary challenge facing our species is the reproduction of our species. The population of the planet is growing with every word you read. There are more than 211,000 people being added every day. I see this change, and I feel it. You can see it as you fly over Africa at night, and you see mile after mile of fires as the scrub is removed to make way for human beings. In the satellite pictures of nocturnal Europe, the whole place lit up. You can see it in the Shanghai skyline, where new skyscrapers are going up round the clock. You can see it as you fly over Mexico City, a vast checkerboard of smog-bound, low-rise dwellings stretching from one horizon to the other; and when you look down on what we are doing to the planet, you have a horrifying vision of habitations multiplying like bacilli in a Petri dish. The world's population is now 6.7 billion.. If I live to my mid-eighties, it will have trebled in my lifetime. The UN last year predicted that there will be 9.2 billion people by 2050, and I cannot understand why no one discusses this impending calamity, and no statesmen have the guts to treat the issue with the seriousness it deserves. How can we discuss global warming, and reducing consumption, when we are continuing to add so relentlessly to the number of consumers? The answer is political cowardice. There was a time, in the 1960s and 1970s, when people were becoming interested in demography, and the UN would hold giant conferences on the subject. But over the years, certain words became taboo, and certain concepts became forbidden, and we have reached the stage where the very discussion of overall human fertility and global motherhood has become more or less banned. All sorts of explanations are offered for the surrender. Some say Indira Gandhi gave it all a bad name, by her demented plan to sterilise Indian men. Some attribute our complacency to the Green Revolution, it became the wisdom that the world's population could rise to umpteen billions, as mankind learned to make several ears of corn grow where one had grown before. In recent years, the idea of global population control has been stifled by a pincer movement from the Right and the Left. American right-wingers disapprove of anything that sounds like birth control, and George W. Bush withholds the contribution America makes to the UN Fund for Population Activities. The Left dislike suggestions of population control because they seem to smack of colonialism and imperialism. So we have reached the absurd position in which humanity bleats about the destruction of the environment, and yet there is not a peep about the population growth that is causing that destruction. The debate is now unavoidable. Look at food prices, driven ever higher by population growth in India and China. Look at the Chinese desire for meat, which has pushed the cost of feed so high that Vladimir Putin has been obliged to institute price controls. In Britain, chicken farmers are finding that the cost of chickenfeed is no longer exactly chickenfeed, and, though the food crisis may be solved by the wit of man, the damage to the environment may be irreversible. It is time we had a grown-up discussion about the optimum quantity of human beings in this country and on this planet. This is not, an argument about immigration per se, since in a sense it does not matter where people come from, and with their skill and their industry, immigrants add hugely to the economy. This is a question of population, and the eventual size of the human race. All the evidence shows that we can reduce population growth, and world poverty, by promoting literacy and female emancipation and access to birth control. Isn't it time politicians stopped being so timid, and started talking about the real number one issue?
Karen Gaia sayys: The article ignores what could be accomplished if enough money were spent on women's reproductive health, contraception, sex education, and girls education. The cost would be less than what we spend on pets in the U.S.   January 14, 2008   Telegraph

Closing the 'Baby Gap'.   In Japan, Russia, Germany and elsewhere in what gurus like to call "the global North," panic has set in about fertility declines, and couples are exhorted to have and are rewarded for producing more children. So fascinated are we in the developed world with this phenomenon that a misinterpretation of world population trends has taken hold. In a majority of nations, there is no shortage of babies. Women there are crying out for help in controlling their fertility. But when foreign aid priorities are set, family planning is no longer high on the list. The 1960s were the high point in family planning. Influential thinkers in richer countries came to accept that pushing family planning was a cultural or even political intrusion. President Bush has just barred for the fifth year U.S. government contributions to the U.N. Population Fund, which does more work in more countries than any other family-planning organization. His action is based on unsubstantiated claims, that the fund aids abortion in China. The U.S. is now $196 million in arrears. By 2025, the richer world will account for just over 1.25 billion of the projected global population of 7.9 billion; by 2050, 8 billion of the world's 9.2 billion people will be in poor nations. Almost all population growth will be among the people who already struggle hardest to survive. A large, young, productive workforce boosts an economy, through a higher birth rate and immigration, but when families and public services are overwhelmed by numbers, a terrible cycle of underachievement goes into motion. The exodus of desperate people from sub-Saharan Africa and parts of South Asia is a symptom of the double burden of underdevelopment and overpopulation. Environmental damage is near- catastrophic. In India, nearly half the children are malnourished and no major city has running water 24 hours a day. Wouldn't the world's environment be better protected by offering more people a managed way to move to less-populated regions, perhaps through a new U.N. agency modeled on the Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees? Wouldn't it be better to help developing nations achieve workable population levels through family planning, while filling current gaps in the working-age population of rich nations through immigration? Europe and Japan would rather have more babies. Does the world really need them?
Karen Gaia says: the trouble with moving people from poor countries to rich countries results in overextending the artificial sustainability of those countries whose economies are based on oil. All will collapse as is already happening in the US. The U.S. is already taking far more resources from other countires than it is providing in return.   September 26, 2007   New York Times*

Is the Planet Full Yet?.   Of the top 50 things to save the planet, to have fewer people is only Number 18. The current population of 6.6 billion people is predicted to rocket to 9.7 billion in the next 40 years. Yet there is a conspicuous silence about the topic of sustainable family planning. Population growth is one of the factors which determines our impact on the Earth's ecosystem and therefore we should talk frankly about it. Population growth could wipe out any gains we make reducing the amount we consume. It has to be a part of the discussion and not ignored as some form of sacred taboo. Friends of the Earth do not campaign on the matter of population, claiming the big issue is resource use. But Green Party Caroline Lucas MEP disagrees. "There's a direct relation between the emissions we produce and how many of us there are." The idea of controlling the population may be distasteful but on a planet with finite resources and an exponentially growing number of people something, has to give. At present we are not able to feed the world's population adequately, yet we produce enough food to do so. That is a failure of our current structures. With the world's population set to rise significantly over the next century, if we can't cope now, how are we going to cope then? By encouraging high levels of immigration we are fuelling the problem because when people come here they are, going to start living our unsustainable lifestyle, too." The South East Plan proposes a further 11,000 homes should be built in Brighton and Hove by 2026, the result is likely to be severe pressure on our natural resources, such as water. Can a city hemmed in by the sea and South Downs accommodate any more without compromising quality of life and the future of the South Downs National Park? According to the UN, there are 78 million people added to the world every year, yet there are 200 million women who want to control their fertility but have no safe and effective access to contraceptive services. We need a major investment in family planning so women can choose their family size. In the Sixties and Seventies, population was a key issue for all the major campaign groups. Oxfam published a paper entitled World Population: The Biggest Problem Of All. But in 2007, to call for such frank discussion runs too great a risk of upsetting the other values environmentalists identify with: human rights, gender equality, race, immigration and, above all, individual choice. We've got to stop being paralysed by the sensitivities the population question naturally taps into and recognise there are actually valid ways to address it which could bring great benefits. The decisions we make relating to family issues, must be left up to individuals, but devoting resources to reproductive health and family planning services brings genuine win-wins in terms of community development and women's rights, as well as smaller populations. Scratch the surface of any environmental problem and it reveals population growth, and the way we live our lives, as the root cause. The need for a population policy has never been more urgent. While governments see big populations as an indicator of economic strength, the population problem will lead to environmental catastrophe.   November 26, 2007   The Argus website

We Face Worldwide Drought with No Contingency Plan.   What happens when there is not enough water to go around? Atlanta is a city in trouble in a region in trouble. Sonny Perdue, Georgia's Baptist governor, led a crowd of hundreds in prayers for rain. It seems, however, that the Almighty was otherwise occupied and the regional drought continued. Water rationing has hit the capital. Car washing and lawn watering are prohibited. Harvests in the region have dropped by 15 to 30%. By the end of summer, local reservoirs and dams were holding 5% of their capacity. But that compares Ankara, Turkey, hit by a fierce drought and high temperatures. Over the last decade, 15 to 20% decreases in precipitation have been recorded, accompanied by record temperatures and increasing wildfires in areas where populations have been growing rapidly. Or the drought that has swept huge parts of Australia, the worst in a century. Morocco has 50% less rainfall than normal. In Mexico's Tehuacán Valley, the drought conditions have made subsistence farming next to impossible. Four cities in Southern California, top the national drought ratings: Los Angeles, San Diego, Oxnard, and Riverside. We don't think of our country as water poor. But acording to the National Climate Data Center, federal officials have declared 43% of the contiguous US to be in "moderate to extreme drought." The Southwest is in the grips of a 'mega-drought,' even the 'worst in 500 years.' Such conditions may represent the region's new "normal weather." The water level of Lake Superior, has fallen to the lowest point on record for this time of year. In the Southeast, 26% of which, according to the National Weather Service, is in a state of "exceptional" drought, tt has been the driest year on record for North Carolina and Tennessee, while eighteen months of blue skies have led Georgia to break every historical record, whether measured by the percentage of moisture in the soil, the flow rate of rivers, inches of rain. Rock Spring, South Carolina, has been without water for a month. Farmers are hauling water by pickup truck to keep their cattle alive. Atlanta, its metropolitan area "watered" mainly by a 1950s man-made reservoir, Lake Lanier, which, is turning into baked mud. With a population of five million and known for its uncontrolled growth (as well as lack of water planning), the city is expected to house another two million inhabitants by 2030. And yet, Atlanta will essentially run out of water. The worst outcome would be mass migrations with bitter interstate court battles over the dwindling water supplies. But before that, if too much water is siphoned from agriculture, farm towns and ranch towns will wither. If drought becomes more widespread, more common in heavily populated parts of the globe already bursting at the seams (and with more people arriving daily), if whole regions no longer have the necessary water, How much burning and suffering and misery are we likely to experience?   November 26, 2007   Alternet

Pollution and Long-Term Environmental Degradation: Impediments to Pakistan’s Growth.   Leaders in the field of climate change and sustainable development provided an account of the threats that developing countries such as Pakistan faced in the wake of increasing pollution as well as long term weather & climate changes. Pakistan is in a quagmire in more ways than one. Our society is in a struggle to win freedom, this time from the corrupt politician-military alliance. At the same time, we face internal threats from religious extremism and suicide attacks, and external geo-political developments. In the middle is an ordinary Pakistani who is unable to earn decent wages, has to deal with rapid inflation and crunch on food supplies, and political-economic chaos around him continues to negatively impact his/her daily job. We are still an agrarian economy. In 2006 the agricultural sector accounted for 22% of the GDP and employs a significant percentage of the working population. Climate change can lead to increased incidences of flooding in Pakistan. According to the UN, this area has an agrarian economy with rice and wheat as the main crops. But all our fields have been destroyed and our livelihoods are in ruins. Two months after the deluge, the water is still running six to seven feet deep across vast tracts of farmland. In Sindh floodwater damaged about 71,806 acres out of a total of 140,000 acres sown for this year's harvest. Rice was hardest hit, with an estimated 3.05 million metric tonnes of produce damaged. The Pakistan Strategic Environmental Assessment by the World Bank, warns of environmental degradation as a threat that undermines Pakistan growth. It is costing Pakistan at least 6 percent of GDP or about Rs. 365 billion (US$ 6 billion) annually. Nearly 50% of the environmental damage cost is attributed to illness and premature mortality. Indoor air pollution alone is the reason for 30,000 child deaths per year. Around one-third of the cost is due to death and illness resulting from waterborne diseases. Reduced agricultural productivity due to soil salinity and erosion accounts for about 20% of the cost. The poor in our country will be the ones bearing the biggest burden of the climate and environment related degradation in health, ecology, and farmland. Environmental damage has severe impact in both rural and urban areas. Over 6% of Pakistan's population is rural and depend on natural resources such agricultural soils, water, rangelands and forests that are strained and degrading. The sustainability of agricultural production is under severe environmental threat. Nearly 40% of the country's irrigated land is water-logged, and 14% is saline. The estimated cost of deforestation is between Rs. 206 to 334 million (US$ 3.4 to 5.5 million) per annum, and up to 80% of the rangeland is degraded. Children are more susceptible to lung and throat diseases, including asthma, emphysema, chronic lung bronchitis and damage to lung's airways. A recent study has found that polyaromatic hydrocarbon compounds present in soot can lead to cancer, especially in children. Pakistan is the most urbanized country in South Asia, and exposure to urban and industrial pollution is a rapidly growing concern. Access to clean water is another burgeoning problem that will be more evident globally in the future. Future wars will be fought over water resources. The health costs associated with waterborne diseases amount to 1.8% GDP. The regulatory framework needs to be strengthened to include drinking water quality standards. Our actions must begin with a realization of how large the problem is and what is at stake if we fail to play our part in curtailing global climate change. We need a collective and systematic effort at the local, regional, national and international level to prevent pollution and large scale environmental degradation. The Government of Pakistan has made considerable progress in raising public awareness of environmental issues, and establishing a framework for environmental management. The main constraints to environmental performance include gaps in incentives and accountability, institutional design, the regulatory framework, and capacity limitations.
Ralph says: First and the most important is to halt the population growth   November 23, 2007   All Things Pakistan

Overshoot, Narcissus, and the Sirens' Song.   Overshoot is a major threat to the future of the human civilization. The danger is magnified by the misperception that much of our journey is "progress." Overshoot: is to increase in numbers so much that the habitat's carrying capacity is exceeded by the ecological load. In the past 10,000 years the human population has increased from 5-10 million to about 6.5 billion in 2005. At first, this growth was sustained by displacing other species, but in the past two hundred years, humanity has expanded based on a precarious practice of rapidly drawing down finite natural resources, many of which are becoming scarce. Overshoot can generate a surge of wealth, for example, as occurred with the discovery of oil in many parts of the world. The subsequent prosperity in the short-term reinforces the belief that this is the proper way to proceed over the longer-term. This is the illusion that currently bewitches the mass of humanity. This road leads inevitably to collapse and die-off. Humanity is in a state of overshoot, and this situation is rapidly worsening with the exponential growth of human numbers. The Union of Concerned Scientists, in 1992, delivered the World Scientists' Warning to Humanity, in which 1,700 of the world's leading scientists, warned: "Human beings and the natural world are on a collision course. If not checked, many of our practices put at serious risk the future that we wish for human society and may so alter the living world that it will be unable to sustain life in the manner that we know. In March 20, 2006, the UN Environment Programme delivered a similar message that warns that humans have provoked the worst spate of extinctions since the dinosaurs were wiped out sixty-five million years ago. We humans are responsible for the sixth major extinction event in the history of Earth. A rising human population of six and a half billion is destroying the environment, the global demand for biological resources now exceeding the planet's capacity to renew them by 20%. The reference here is serious for the human future as is the rapid drawdown of non-renewable resources such as fossil fuels and base metals. World fish stocks are down by 90% since the dawn of modern industrialized fishing about 1950. Some desperate fishers have taken to bombing coral reefs, turning them into underwater deserts. * A third of all amphibians, over a fifth of mammals, and a quarter of coniferous trees, are threatened with extinction. Human activity has caused between fifty and a thousand times more extinctions in the last one hundred years than would have happened due to natural processes. The UN World Water Development Report projects that, at worst, as many as seven billion people in sixty countries could face water scarcity by 2050. There is increasing agreement that the point at which the global production of petroleum will begin to decline, has already occurred. Inexpensive oil is the foundation of modern industrial civilization and declining supplies will have a devastating effect on most aspects of human life: Ninety percent of transportation is fuelled by oil. Oil is essential for construction, consumer products, heating, manufacturing, and electronics. It is critical for modern agriculture: fertilizers, farm machinery, pesticides, refrigeration, and transportation. Peak oil marks the end of the growth phase of global industrial society. With globalization in full swing, resource hungry corporations, hyperactive consumers and restless migrants threaten to pick the planet clean. The risks of overshoot are so overwhelming one is left in astonishment that humanity has not responded with a profound shift towards sustainability. The explosive growth of human population is at the core of overshoot. Human societies to press for the expansion of human numbers and consumption and to resist changes that are perceived as unpleasant in the short-term. In 1798 England was in the midst of rapid population growth and there were many poor. Malthus stated that in nature, plants and animals produce far more offspring than can survive, and that humans are capable of overproducing. Malthus maintained that actual population growth is kept in line with the growth of food supply by famine, pestilence, and disease, or by preventive checks, for example, the postponement of marriage. These days, we would include a whole range of contraceptives. Malthus was criticized when he concluded that the poor could not be helped except by an elevation of the death rate or a lowering of the birth rate. Social reformers from the early 1800s to the present day believe that with proper institutional structures, most human ills can be eradicated. Social reformers tend to overestimate what the living Earth can supply to meet human demands. Politicians like to deliver promises of a better life for all and have been inclined to side with the social reformers. This preference for growth receives support from most institutions, including corporations, which have been designed for growth, and the major religions. Scientific observers have a different perspective of time than social reformers. Social reformers say: "Provide more nurture for the species now." Scientific observers suggest: "Nurture the planet that nurtures the species." The demands of the social reformers are more immediate and direct; the warnings of the scientific observers are more long-term and the perceived benefits, indirect. The Brundtland Report set out the strategic imperatives for sustainable development, including: ensuring a sustainable level of population. An unfortunate coincidence of factors diminished the impetus to implement the strategic imperatives for sustainable development. Between 1980 and 2000, the prices of most commodities fell and the ramping up of production of petroleum from the North Sea created a sense of abundance. This reinforced the belief among some social reformers that the market forces would bring about more efficient production and increase the wealth for many. However, with the exception of economic growth, the market forces have not met the strategic imperatives for sustainable development. A study published in early 2005 and presented some sobering information. It states that humans have changed ecosystems more rapidly and extensively in the past fifty years than in any other period. Some 60% of ecosystem elements such as fresh water, clean air, and a relatively stable climate, are being used unsustainably and the situation could become worse during the first half of this century. The Study stated that "the overriding conclusion of this assessment is that it lies within the power of human societies to ease the strains we are putting on the services of this planet, while continuing to use them to bring better living standards to all." It also said that "achieving this will require radical changes in the way nature is treated at every level of decision-making and new ways of cooperation between government, business, and civil society. The warning signs are there for all of us to see. The future now lies in our hands." The denial of overshoot is rooted in various emotions such as, greed, and the desire to continue the momentum of existing structures that are designed to promote the growth of human numbers and consumption. We humans are about to discover that the continuation of civilization will require that we address overshoot with the full strength of our reason and emotion. We face a dilemma. Population growth increases demand and helps to fuel economic growth. If human economic activity does not continue to grow, industrial societies will become unstable, and if human activities continue their current rate of growth, the life support system of the ecosphere will collapse. It is preferable to rein in growth and to learn how to adapt to the challenges of a shrinking economy before it is forced upon us by environmental catastrophes and chaos. We now have no alternative but to adopt actions that may be contrary to our nature. We need to back off, stop killing thousands of species of plants and animals, and curtail our own expansionary drives. If we cannot implement these and similar measures, Nature will most surely do it for us. Nature may control our numbers better than we can ourselves. Nature has removed the sick and the weak from the population indiscriminately thereby improving the overall health of our species and others. Population growth is at the root of human expansion but the subject of population is emotional and taboo. Powerful institutions continue to support population growth. The strength of the sexual impulse cannot be denied. The individual freedom of choice to have a child pits individual rights against the collective good. The first step is for world leaders to acknowledge that overshoot will lead to profound changes to all societies. It is possible to mitigate the effects of overshoot by early anticipation and wise choice. The alternative will be a series of crises, followed by collapse and die-off. All governments should calculate the carrying capacity of their respective countries. All governments must understand that national strategies to encourage falling birth rates have been a factor in improving human well-being in many countries, including South Korea, Thailand, and China. Appropriate means of contraception should be made available to the poor of all countries. Prosperous countries should make a determined effort to improve the level of education in poorer countries, especially the education of women and children. Countries that allow their populations to rise beyond carrying capacity must face the results of their actions. There is a huge unmet need for family planning. Ultimately, the various peoples of the world will have to assume the responsibility to restore their respective regions into lands of hope. A few generations of below replacement fertility could reduce the global population to sustainable levels. Below replacement fertility is already a reality in fifty-one countries including China. We need to recognize that the Earth is the only home we have.   May 2006   J. Anthony Cassils - Population Institute of Canada

Africa;: Population Growth Highest Around Lake Victoria.   The annual population growth rate of 7% around Lake Victoria is the highest in Africa. Africa's population was growing at 2.5% annually. This is because most urban centres are located around Lake Victoria and opportunities like fishing have attracted migrants. A report by state minister for environment said the soil around the lake was suitable for agriculture. The population growth presented a challenge because of the increased demand for food, leading to encroachment on protected areas. This rapid population growth and urbanisation has resulted in environmental degradation. The population growth rate was higher than the economic growth, which undermines development efforts aimed at improving livelihood and sustainable use of the environment. In the last two decades, fresh water resources have been exposed to severe pollution and that has encouraged growth of weeds like the water hyacinth. The population increase has also led to encroachment on the wetlands and the continued disappearance of forests on private land and gazetted forest reserves. The water level has dropped by more than a metre. The country's wetlands are threatened by pollution, unplanned development, and agriculture.   November 06, 2007   Africa News Service

The Road Well Travelled: Are We Already Shutting Our Minds to the Consequences of Climate Change?.   Cormac McCarthy's book The Road considers what would happen if the world lost its biosphere, and the only living creatures were humans, hunting for food. Years before the action begins, the protagonist hears the last birds passing over; McCarthy makes no claim that this is likely to occur, but speculates about the consequences. All social codes are replaced with organised butchery, then chaotic, blundering horror. What else are the survivors to do?: It is hard to see how this could happen during humanity's time on earth. But his thought experiment exposes the one terrible fact: our dependence on biological production remains absolute. So when I read the UN's new report on the state of the planet, my mind kept snagging on a handful of figures. There were some bright spots - lead has been removed from petrol almost everywhere, sulphur emissions have been reduced in most rich nations. But the issue that stopped me was production. Crop production has improved over the past 20 years (from 1.8 tonnes per hectare in the 1980s to 2.5 tonnes today), but it has not kept up with population. "World cereal production per person peaked in the 1980s, and has since slowly decreased ". There will be roughly 9 billion people by 2050: feeding them would require a doubling of world food production. Unless we cut waste, overeating, biofuels and the consumption of meat, total demand for cereal crops could rise to three times the current level. There are two limiting factors. One, is phosphate: it is not clear where future reserves might lie. The immediate problem is water. "Meeting the MDG on hunger will require doubling of water use. Water scarcity is acute in many regions, and farming takes the lion's share of water from streams and groundwater. "One-tenth of the world's major rivers no longer reach the sea all round the year. "If present trends continue, 1.8 billion people will be living in countries or regions with absolute water scarcity by 2025, and two thirds of the world population could be subject to water stress." The biggest cause of the coming droughts is climate change. Last week we learnt that climate change could eliminate half the world's species); that 25 primate species are already slipping into extinction; that biological repositories of carbon are beginning to release it, decades ahead of schedule. But everyone is waiting for everyone else to move. In every major energy sector - aviation, transport, power generation, house building, coal mining, oil exploration - the government is promoting policies that will increase emissions. How will it make the 60% cut the bill enforces? The only certain means of preventing runaway climate change is to cut emissions here and now. The BBC schedules are crammed with shows urging us to travel further, drive faster, build bigger, buy more, yet are deemed to offend the rules, which really means that they don't offend the interests of business or the pampered sensibilities of the Aga class.
Ralph says: not a word about population.   October 30, 2007   Monbiot.com

Is Chicken Little Right?.   From a conversation between Paul Ehrlich who is Bing Professor of Population Studies at Stanford University, and Gellerman of PBS -- GELERMAN: The UN panel warns that even "mass extinction" is possible. Among the most famous of pessimistic predictions is from biologist Paul Ehrlich. In 1968 Ehrlich wrote "The Population Bomb," a landmark book in which he predicted that as a result of an exploding population, by 1985, quote: 'the battle to feed all of humanity will be over,' And that, 'in the 1970s and 80s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now.' EHRLICH: In 1993, 58 academies of science said - that is basically all the academies of science in the world - said if we don't change our ways, we're doomed. And 1500 of the world's leading scientists sent out a statement called "World Scientists' Warning to Humanity," said exactly the same thing. The scientific community has been trying to warn society about the various things we're facing and it just hasn't penetrated the media or certainly governments. GELLERMAN: But back in 1968 when you wrote "The Population Bomb," you wrote that the battle to feed all of humanity is over. That was what - 40 years ago? EHRLICH: We still have about a billion people who don't get enough food to function properly. In 1968 in the same book I warned about the possibilities of global warming, and that's something the scientific community has known about since about 1898. None of this stuff is new. It's just a massive report happened to come out of the UN saying 'all the trends are in the wrong direction.' GELLERMAN: According to the UN report, by 2050 there will be about 9.7 billion people on the planet. Is that in excess of the carrying capacity of the planet? EHRLICH: Certainly in anything like today's lifestyle. If everyone has the absolute minimum to keep them alive - it might be possible. GELLERMAN: Did you say 'battery chicken?' EHRLICH: Battery chickens are these situations where you raise billions of chickens in one building, you know where every chicken as a square foot and just is in there and gets fed and uh, grows. That's the battery-chicken world, where everybody is living the absolutely minimum standard of living so you can maximize the number of people. If we want, for example, the United States to go on for thousands and thousands of years, the way to do it isn't to see how many people we can cram in in the next 20. You've got to remember we're at about 6.6 billion now, talking about adding about 2.5 billion more. The next two and a half billion are going to be a lot more expensive to take care of environmentally than the previous 2.5 billion because people are smart, they farm the best lands first. You know you can't get oil by sticking a pointed stick in the ground in Pennsylvania anymore. You got to drill down a couple of miles. And water has to be transported long distances. ... Ask them in Atlanta, where they're running out of water. Ask them in Southern California, where climate change is helping huge fires to devastate areas. GELERMAN: According to the UN report, each person on the planet needs about 22 hectares. But I'm thinking, you know, there's Hong Kong, there's New York, you know EHRLICH: Well, that's right but the thing you got to remember is that the people in New York don't live on New York. They import stuff from acres all over the rest of the world. It's a common fallacy - it's actually been named by the scientific community 'the Netherlands fallacy,' the idea that the whole planet can be as crowded as the Netherlands. And of course it's not people versus area, it's people versus the resources that support them. And those resources include things called 'sinks,' like the capacity of the atmosphere to absorb carbon dioxide. That's a very important resource for the planet. It's one we're overusing at the moment. Many things are not mentioned in the media. For instantce, many people feel that the number of toxic substances we're adding to the environment are an even bigger threat than global warming. In many villages in the Arctic and sub Arctic, there are only half as many male babies being born as female babies and it's likely a sign of the hormone-mimicking chemicals that we manufacture, release into the environment, and that are carried by the climate systems to the poles. The threat of emerging diseases - the first one of course, has been AIDS, the first really big one in recent decades - but the more people we have, the greater the threat - particularly to the ones that malnourished - of new plagues taking over, a new flu, and so on. GELLERMAN: So it has not reached the tipping point? EHRLICH: We don't know. But what other choice do we have but to try and change so that if we haven't reached the tipping point, we don't reach it, because the tipping point is going to be miserable and an awful lot of people will die and lifestyles will change very, very dramatically. What we can say is that societies can change very rapidly when the time is ripe. Look for instance how rapidly the Soviet Union disappeared when none of us expected it to.   Living on Earth

Passport to Sustainability - Chico State’s Annual Environmental Conference Boasts Big Names with Big Ideas.   From a sustainability conference in Chico California: Looking back at the 1960s and early '70s, environmental issues were of national interest leading to major legislation and the formulation of agencies such as the U.S. EPA. But the 30-some years later, replete with failed environmental protection in the political realm, has led to global temperature increases of 0.8 degrees centigrade with another 1.4-1.5 degrees in the pipeline. The figures are close to the 2-degree increase that a majority of climate scientists consider as the point of no return. We have to have the courage to stare down the barrel at these numbers we're not going to get a second chance. The estimate is of 150,000-180,000 annual deaths due to climate-driven events. Without intervention, future generations will be dealing with planetary destabilization; the result of heat waves, drought, shrinking crop patterns, increasing deserts and rises in sea levels, among other ill effects. The ecological issues facing mankind go beyond party lines. They are not about Republican versus Democrat or liberal versus conservative; they are about protecting the environment for those who come after us. The president of the Global Population Education acknowledged that the topic of population makes people feel uneasy, but said it shouldn't. Worldwide, 350 million women have told health surveys that they don't want more children, or they want to space the time between their pregnancies to protect the lives of their children. If the same women had the means and the knowledge to control their fertility, it would stabilize the world population at 8 billion, he said. What's hidden in the population statistics is that 99% of growth is in the world's poorest countries. Solving the problems of those people, will help create a sustainable planet. He cited four things we should all be concerned about: declining forests, topsoil erosion, expanding deserts and a changing global climate. Solutions to the global population problem are simple. The first is to ensure every girl in the world gets an eighth-grade education. Second, women need access to employment opportunities. Efforts need to be taken to reduce the infant mortality rate. Women in developing nations often choose to have many children to increase the chances that some of their babies will survive to childhood. And last, women need universal access to family-planning practices. Slowing down population growth becomes a requirement that all of us need to address because there are no acceptable alternatives.
Karen Gaia says: Women also need access to reproductive health care.   November 08, 2007   Chico News & Review

Population Explosion Threatens Development Gains.   If the people of Niger remain uninformed about family planning and keep reproducing at the current rate the country's population will quadruple by 2050. Niger's population is counted by the Institute for National Statistics (INS), which calculates the current rate of population growth is 3.3% every year. If that growth continues, there will be 56 million people living in Niger by 2050, compared to 13.5 million today. The average number of children per mother is 7.1. When asked how many they would like to have - women said nine and men said 12, but some families said they would like 40 or 50 children. This is a society that encourages procreation. Just 5% of Nigeriens use family planning and contraception. The 85% of Nigeriens who currently rely on rain-fed subsistence agriculture, are going to be hardest hit as millions more people compete for the same farmland. Niger's cultivatable land could be less because of soil degradation and the effects of climate change. It has been identified as one of the regions most likely to be adversely affected by climate change. The increase in population will accentuate the cereal production and wood-for-fuel deficits which started in the 1980s. Niger's population will also overtake the government's ability to provide adequate health, education, jobs and even water points. The capital Niamey remains small compared to most Sahelian capitals with a population of around 700,000. At least 85% of the Nigerien population relies on rainfed subsistence farming. 94% of Nigeriens live on 35% of the land. The most populated areas are along the southern border with Burkina Faso and Mali. The Maradi region,, holds 20% of the population, some 2,235,748 people, living on 3.3% of the country's land. Niger's desert and mountain north accounts for 53% of Niger's territory but is inhabited by only 3% of the population - 321,639 people. Niger's government put in place a "national action plan" to curb population growth. The government wants the number practising family planning to increase from 5% to 15% or 20% by 2015. The plan also calls for information campaigns to educate religious leaders and especially women about the availability and importance of family planning. It proposes that early marriages be cut. Currently, every second girl is married and likely to be procreating before the age of 15. Raising the marriage age to 18 would take up to four years off a woman's reproductive life. By 2015 population growth should have slowed to 2.5% and the average number of children produced per woman should be five. If the demographics continue, Niger cannot develop. All the resources will be going into social services and nothing will be left for investing in the economy.   December 18, 2007   Africa News Service

Nepal;: Sustainable Development Needs More Actions, Less Rethoric.   Katmandu has changed. Trips in the city take at least two hours, we can no longer see the Himalayas, their snow caps have disappeared and the rivers have become open sewers. The population of Katmandu increased from around 200,000 about 20 or 30 years ago, to nearly two million. According to the GEO-4 report, the global population has grown by 34% to more than 6.7 billion. Trade is increased 3 times, and the average income per capita has gone up by about 40% from US$5,927 in 1987 to US$8,162 in 2004. Population and economic growth have increased demand on natural resources, and placed increasing pressure on the environment, representing serious and persistent barriers to sustainable development. The world as a whole is living far beyond its means. The human population is now so large that the amount of resources needed to sustain it exceeds what is available. The well-being of billions of people in the developing world is at risk, because of failure to remedy relatively simple problems which have been successfully tackled elsewhere. In Asia and the Pacific, ecosystems and human health continue to deteriorate, while population growth and rapid economic development have caused significant environmental degradation and loss of natural resources. Among the serious environmental problems are urban air pollution, lack of fresh water, and increased waste. In the region, some 655 million people lack access to safe water. The growing energy needs and the growth in motor vehicles are causing serious damage. For Asia and the Pacific, climate change would cause severe droughts and floods, soil degradation, coastal inundation and salt water intrusion caused by sea level rise. Agricultural productivity is likely to decline substantially. Environmental and economic policies have not been fully integrated. The quality of economic growth was more important than its number or percentage. Economic growth has to be green. But unfortunately, many Asian countries have copied the US in appreciating economic growth. Bangkok has copied the US in developing its transportation infrastructure which has led to traffic jams. Sustainability could be achieved by integrating the environment into development. The environmental awareness of the world community and its leaders have improved a lot but their actions are not adequate. Our Common future depends on our actions today, not tomorrow or some time in the future.   November 05, 2007   Antara

Paper on Environment and Family Planning by Joe Speidel.   Population seems to have dropped off the environmental agenda, due to three factors: controversy around population, family planning, abortion, and reproductive health; the political dominance of an anti-environmental White House and Congress; and a shifting of priorities due to difficult fights over a variety of immediate threats to the environment. Less attention has been focused on the consequences of population programs and, their environmental implications. Family planning and reproductive health advocates in the US face opposition from ideological conservatives, who try to minimize the significance of population growth or to limit the medical options of those seeking to avoid pregnancy and disease. This paper seeks to refocus the attention of environmentalists on the importance of population trends to environmental sustainability and identifies prevention of unintended pregnancy as potential common ground for environmentalists and family planning advocates. Continued growth in the world's population will add to the environmental burden and, will undermine the prospects for socioeconomic development. The impact of humans is related to population size, per capita consumption, and the environmental impact of the technology used to produce what is consumed. Between 1950 and 2000, the world's population went from 2.5 to 6.1 billion. At the same time, the gross world product expanded from approximately $7 trillion to $46 trillion of annual output. Continued growth in per capita consumption, at a rate of just 2% annually, would result in a four-fold increase in per capita consumption by 2075. To achieve this without further degradation of important ecosystems presents a daunting challenge. Humans have changed ecosystems more rapidly and extensively over the past 50 years than during any other period, primarily to meet increasing demands for food, fresh water, timber, fiber, and fuel. Global forest cover has declined by 50% since pre-agricultural times. Fisheries are endangered: with one billion people dependent on fish for protein, 75% have been over-fished. Cropland is shrinking because of soil erosion and desertification, and crop yields are threatened by rising temperatures and inadequate water supply. Water tables are falling as 15 countries containing half of the world's people, a total of 3.26 billion, are over pumping aquifers. If family planning efforts are not strengthened and current levels of fertility remain unchanged, then world population is projected to reach 11.9 billion by 2050. Previously high fertility rates have left many poor countries with large numbers of women of reproductive age; as they have children, population size will increase even as fertility rates decline. High-fertility persists in much of the world, ensuring that population growth will continue. Out of 210 million pregnancies worldwide - 80 million - 38% are unplanned, and 46 million (22 % of all pregnancies) end in abortion. Unintended pregnancy in the US accounts for roughly half of the current increase of 2.9 million people each year. Between 2000 and 2004, 4.3 million immigrants, including an estimated two million illegal immigrants, arrived in the country. Provision of family planning services is the most direct intervention to slow population growth. Access to safe abortion is necessary for women to fully control their fertility. Unintended pregnancy remains a major problem for the US and makes a significant contribution to population growth. Conservation planners generally understand the importance of population issues but have often given them a lower priority than deserved. Reasons include lack of scientific expertise, the belief that tackling population issues is too controversial or unlikely to yield success, and a perceived absence of moral standing given the disproportionately high rates of consumption in developed countries. The population field needs increased commitment, appropriate policies, and adequate human and financial resources. If these conditions are fulfilled, population growth will slow, reproductive health will be improved, and the environment protected. There is also an urgent need for Americans, in particular, to reduce consumption of critical natural resources and the resulting waste and pollution. The original article has a great deal of detailed information and should be read by anyone with keen interest in the subject.   September 03, 2007   Bixby Center for Reproductive Health Research & Policy

UN: Planet in Peril, Time to Act is Now.   Global warming, extinction of species and feeding an expanding world population are threatening the planet and putting "humanity at risk," according to the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP). The objective is an urgent call for action, as our future depends on our actions today. The Global Environment Outlook report (GEO-4) was prepared by nearly 400 scientists and more than 1,000 others worldwide. It was designed to assess issues climate change, water and biodiversity and identify priorities for action. Response has been slow and fails to recognize the magnitude of the challenges. Major problems discussed in the report included land use, water, pollution, climate change and population growth that exceeds the resources available for sustainability. Fundamental changes in social and economic structures, including lifestyle are crucial. The average temperatures in the Arctic are rising twice as rapidly as in the rest of the world and in some cases, is having severe effects on human health, food production, security and resource availability. Contaminated water remains the greatest single cause of human disease and death. In developing countries, 3 million people die annually from waterborne diseases. The escalating water demand will become intolerable in water-scarce countries. Of the world's major rivers, 10% fail to reach the sea due to irrigation demands. By 2025, water demands overall are predicted to rise by 50% in developing countries and by 18% in the developed world. There is a need for an integrated and sustainable approach to water resource management. Available supplies are under great duress as a result of high population growth, unsustainable consumption patterns, poor management practices, pollution, inadequate investment in infrastructure and low efficiency. Changes in biodiversity are the fastest in human history. Species are becoming extinct 100 times faster than the rate shown in the world's fossil record. Global pollution is projected to increase 85% over the next 20 years. Projections that the world's population will increase to more than 9 billion by 2050 will require a doubling of food production. With a shift from cereal to meat consumption combined with over-consumption and waste, food demand will increase 2.5 to 3.5 times the current level. By 2030, developing countries will need more than 296 million acres to feed themselves and our capacity to meet these demands is contested. We are living far beyond our means. The amount of resources needed to sustain the human population exceeds what is available. Humanity's demand is 54 acres per person while the Earth's capacity is only 39 acres per person. Total annual income of nearly 1 billion people who make up the population of the world's richest countries is 15 times that of the 2.3 billion people in the poorest countries. In particular, climate change and the loss of biodiversity may eventually cross critical thresholds in the Earth system. "Energy, climate change, industrial development and air pollution are critical items. The systematic destruction of the Earth's natural resources has reached a point where the economic viability of economies is being challenged, and where the bill we hand on to our children may prove impossible to pay.   October 29, 2007   Disaster News Network

Fiscal Gains Under Threat From Population Growth in Kenya.   Over the last two decades, the rate at which the Kenyan population is growing remains a major impediment to steady economic growth. Population control is a key factor in building a sound economic growth. Kenya's economy has yet to reach the 8% required for at least 15 years before the country can claim an industrial nation status under the Vision 2030 initiative. The economy has picked up from negative 0.4% in 2002 to 2.8% in 2003 and 4.3% in 2004. 2005 had a 5.% growth, to 6.1% last year and a projected 6% this year. This is a reduction in poverty levels from 56% in 2002 to 46% in 2006, but this cannot be sustained if the population growth takes an upward trend. The government is preparing to spend Sh7 billion on a population census in 2 years since the last two censuses were bungled by political considerations. Experts project that Kenya's population will stand at 40 million up from the current 33 million, causing strains on families and individuals. The higher population will provide a reality check on the policies such as free education up to secondary level and free medical care at government hospitals for selected ailments. The pressure of such a population explosion would result in rising costs for education, health services, and food imports and an inability to generate resources to build housing in both urban and rural areas. Kenya's population pressure comes from the fact more than half is composed of individuals under 30 years. Accelerating population growth should be slowed as it cannot match the economic expansion. Kenya has none of the birth control measures like the number of children each family should bear and relies on voluntary family planning. The methods distort the structure of the population in favour of the poor who tend to bring forth more children. The relatively rich and well educated take up birth control measures. The poor will feel the pinch of the population growth. The country's explosive growth in population was caused by falls in mortality rates and the traditional preference for large families. Kenya was the first country in sub-Saharan Africa to view runaway population growth as a serious impediment to economic prosperity. The country is experiencing a population surge despite an official population policy, which calls for matching population size with available resources yet leaves decisions on family size up to individual families. Promotion of family planning fall largely on the local health-care offices and NGO's. Kenya's population policy tends to frame the need for family planning around the overuse of land and scarcity of jobs. The policy also aims at demystifying contraceptive methods and providing assurance of their safety and utility.   September 03, 2007   Business Daily

Population and American Complacency.   In 1973, when the U.S. population was about 210 million, Professor Holdren judged that our nation was already overpopulated, and that, “given that population growth aggravates or impedes the solution of a wide variety of other problems, it should be obvious that the optimum rate of population growth is zero or negative until such time as the uncertainties have been removed and the problems solved. We have maintained that the optimum rate of population growth is negative until our U.S. population, after a period of gradual population decline, has been stabilized at a level that would be sustainable indefinitely. We judge that level to be no more than 150 million. With the urgent need for a far smaller U.S. population apparent, we have found no other major national population, immigration reform, or environmental organization willing to join with us in calling for a negative rate of population growth. Now, with our U.S. population 100 million larger and heading toward 420 million or more by mid-century, we hope to see these issues in an updated paper. We believe that this time his message would have much more resonance with our national opinion and business leaders, and policy makers.   September 04, 2007   NPG

Talk by Daniel Quinn.   During your lifetime, we are going to figure out how to live sustainably on this planet, or not. If we figure out how to, then humanity will extend into the future. If they don't then the human race is going to be among the species that we're driving into extinction every day. The human population is going to increase to nine billion by the middle of the century. Most who make this estimate seem think this is okay. It isn't. It costs a lot to produce the food to maintain six billion. But in order to maintain the six billion of us, we need the biomass of two hundred species and when we've used them up they're gone forever. Maintaining a population of six billion humans costs two hundred species a day. It's happening every day, day after day and that's what makes it unsustainable. The extraordinary thing is that a second renaissance is going to occur. During the first Renaissance, reason and authority were toppled by observation and experimentation. Science as we know it came into being and the Industrial Revolution. We all saw ourselves as individually valuable. Just like the people of the Middle Ages, we're sure that people will go on thinking the way we think forever, and go on living the way we live. We're like people living in the penthouse of a tall brick building. Every day we need two hundred bricks to maintain our walls, so we go downstairs, knock two hundred bricks out of the walls below, and bring them back upstairs for our own use. This in not a sustainable way to maintain a brick building. Making two hundred species extinct every day is similarly not a sustainable way to maintain a living community. Even if we're in some sense at the top of that community, one day, sooner or later, it's going to collapse, and when it does, our being at the top won't help us. We'll come down along with all the rest. We can't increase the amount of biomass on this planet. We can't increase the amount of land and water that supports life. We're shifting the biomass of species we don't care about into the biomass of species we do care about: into cows, chickens, corn, beans, tomatoes and so on. We're destroying the biodiversity of the living community to support ourselves.   March 07, 2002   The New Renaissance

Save the Planet? It's Now Or Never, Warns Landmark UN Report.   Humanity is changing Earth's fast and devouring resources voraciously. It is poised to bequeath a ravaged planet to future generations. The need couldn't be more urgent to act now to safeguard our own survival and that of future generations. The destruction of the Earth's natural resources has reached a point where the bill we hand on to our children may prove impossible to pay. There have been five mass extinctions in 450 million years, the latest of which occurred 65 million years ago. A sixth is under way, caused by human behaviour. Over the past two decades, growing prosperity has strengthened the capacity to confront the environmental challenges ahead. Global response has been woefully inadequate. Climate is changing faster than at any time in the past 500,000 years. Global average temperatures rose by 0.74 degrees Celsius over the past century and are forecast to rise by 1.8 to four C. by 2100. Earth's population is so big that the resources needed to sustain it exceeds what is available. In Africa, land degradation and desertification are threats; per capita food production has declined by 12% since 1981. Fish consumption has more than tripled over the past 40 years but catches have declined for 20 years. Over 30% of amphibians, 23% of mammals and 12% of birds are threatened. Some of the progress in reducing pollution in developed countries has been at the expense of the developing world. For some of the persistent problems, the damage may already be irreversible. The only way to address these harder problems requires moving the environment from to the core of decision-making: environment for development, not development to the detriment of environment.
Ralph says: Hurrah. At last the UN have the guts to tell it like it is.. Needs to be repeated every month.   October 26, 2007   AFP

Sustainability and Social Well-being.   There is a relationship between environmental crises and social instability. Developing world communities with healthy environments and sound practices see faster gains in alleviating poverty. An atlas overlays information on population and household expenditures with data on water availability, wood supply, wildlife populations, and the like, to yield a picture of how land, people, and prosperity are related in Kenya. The principles discussed are pretty universal. As the world warms, states at risk face threats to their groundwater, agriculture, and ecosystems, factors that can rapidly undo political and economic gains. On the other hand, if the eco-decline/ poverty/ violence and corruption can cause social failures, working on all three elements at once offers the chance for radical improvements. To what degree is the environmental degradation the result of the failure of governance, and to what degree is the environmental degradation a contributor to the failure of governance? This is an important question. The acceleration of global warming will mean more than economic loss and climate refugees. Many of the worst problems we now face have very long lagtimes, and leaders today have been handed bombs whose fuses are just now running short. The desertification in the Sahel is at least partly climate-driven, and are fueling various forms of instability from Sudan to Mali. Some of the pressures result from decisions made recently, but many others, population growth, created by better public health practices under colonial rule and since. Climate change emissions fall squarely on the shoulder of the US and Western Europe. So if states in the Sahel begin failing, to what extent can we describe their environmentally-linked failures as their own?   June 20, 2007   World Changing

Heating Up.   Significant change can't happen without talking, educating and persuading. It's important that local citizens understand that many of the most meaningful responses must be accomplished in our backyard. It is crucial that policies be forged to reduce carbon emissions and slow the warming of the Earth. But if we are not aware on the local level that we all have a responsibility, the effort will be useless. Leadership must come not only from elected officials, but also average citizens who care about the future. Everyone has a stake in this struggle, for example, Leon County government is not required by law to have a landfill gas-collection system. But the county installed one at the Apalachee Parkway facility at a cost of $625,000. More gas can be collected if more wells were added. Meanwhile, discussions are being held with a private firm to increase landfill gas production. But government could and should be doing a lot more. Policies that promote sprawl and discourage alternative transportation options result in increased carbon emissions. With Florida's population expected to grow by 50% over the next 25 years, habitat fragmentation, and reduced agricultural and forest lands will be the inevitable result unless growth is managed wisely with attention to enhancing sustainability. Citizens have an important role by considering other ways to get around besides driving, insisting on more responsible land-use, and recycling more. The chairman of the Greater Tallahassee Chamber of Commerce, is promoting public-private cooperation to improve recycling efforts among local businesses. Our air, water and climate don't respect political boundaries. As long as we consider environmental protection someone else's responsibility, we hasten its deterioration.
Karen Gaia says: nevermind addressing the root cause: population. It's a hush-hush topic. Let's just "manage" the growth. Apparently there is no limit as to how many people whose consumption and waste we can "manage"   October 03, 2007   Tallahassee Democrat

Saudi Arabia - Demographic Trends to Watch for.   Population growth in Saudi Arabia grew at 3.32% from 1950 to 1974, and has slowed to 2.75% in 2004. The dip is mainly due to a decreased influx in the expatriate workforce, but population growth amongst Saudis has declined from 3.87% in 1992 to 2.49% in 2004. The decline can be explained by: increased urbanisation, improved literacy amongst females, and openness to the modern world through satellites and the internet. This downward trend is likely to continue. Population is expected to grow at 2.07% over the next decade, after which it will decline to around 1.54% during 2015-2025. The growth in modernisation will push fertility down faster than these figures suggest. Saudi Arabia covers 2.1 million square miles, 80% of the Arabian Peninsula. Almost half is uninhabitable; hence there is a high concentration of population in some areas. Out of 119 cities in 2004, 80% of the population lives in 31 cities. More than half the population is concentrated in seven cities. The Saudi Arabian population currently contains more than six million expatriates. More than half live in the two main cities - Riyadh 28% and Jeddah 23%. Since 1992, the expatriate population has been stagnant at 26% and this is likely to reduce or remain static. The most pronounced feature of the Saudi national demography is its young population. More than 41% is under 14, another 18% is 15-24. It represents a fast expanding labour force. For Saudi Arabia, it is the big challenge. Unemployment is high 25% by the US Department of State. This is perplexing given the literacy rate amongst Saudis males 85% and females 75%. This is because companies shopped for the cheapest labour around the world. While unemployment amongst locals is the outcome, related job segmentation is perhaps even more harmful. The education system has not been designed to equip the youth with the skills or attitude required by a modern economy. Complacency on the part of many students, a very high proportion of university graduations being in the humanities, and the picture is stark. Saudi Arabia needs 200,000 new jobs every year. Fortunately there is scope to say that things seem to be moving in the right direction. With a decrease in the influx of expat workers, the job market will become competitive. The importance of a modern professional education will considerably increase, and modern educational plans better match employers' needs. The average household size in Saudi Arabia has seen a downward trend from 7.4 people in 1987 to 5.7 in 2004, and indications show a further reduction to around 4 by 2015. The overall decrease in household size can safely be attributed almost entirely to Saudis. A study found a trend towards smaller families. It revealed that Saudis realise the need for smaller families, mainly due to economic reasons. Marketers will have to align their products to smaller families. Currently, there are around four million households compared to around 1.9 million in 1987. This suggests an