Transcript Lecture 4 - WordPress.com
Slide 1
Sustainability
We are turning resources into pollution at unsustainable
rates. What do you think has been causing this?
1. Growing populations
2. Increasing wealth
3. Economists want more consumption to stimulate
job growth. We have no experience running an
economy any other way.
This presentation discusses the basis of our overconsumption problem and lists some of the things we
can do about it.
Slide 2
Since 1800 Wikipedia and the CIA World
Factbook estimate that the Gross World
Product (the combined product of all
nations) has grown from U.S. $175 billion
to $84.97 trillion.
A growth rate of 48,554%.
The population grew 725%
during that same period
Slide 3
Can the world produce enough food to
feed 7.2 billion people?
Although population writers T.R. Malthus (18th-century),
Paul Ehrlich (The Population Bomb, 1968), and Lester Brown
(several current books) predicted eminent famine ̶
David Lam, Chairman of the University of Michigan Institute for
Social Research said in his 2011 Presidential Address:
"The world is producing three times as much food today as
in 1960; the population is two times what it was in 1960, so
there's 41% higher food production per capita. During (that
time)... prices for food (fell and ended up) … at about half in
2000 of what they were in 1960.”
Note: Food prices have been rising since 2000.
Slide 4
Food production responds more to income than need.
The wealthiest 20% consume about half of the world’s food output. 800
million people suffer from undernourishment problems or starvation (a
falling percentage).
Meanwhile, farms, stores, restaurants, and affluent people discard 40% of
the foods we grow. Waste food disposal is a costly, methane-generating
problem. We probably grow enough to feed 9B people now.
Slide 5
But we are gradually losing good farmland
Most urban expansion
consumes farmland.
8,000 square miles of
farm-land per year are
lost to urban sprawl.
The U.S. has paved a
land mass equal to the
size of Georgia.
Poor African and Asian farmers are losing traditional farmlands
to wealthy interests, which keeps the poor from growing their
own food. The World Bank estimates that land grabs have taken
140 million acres – more cropland than we use for wheat or
corn.
Slide 6
Soil loss
Topsoil loss. About half of the world’s non-forested topsoil has been
lost to erosion, salt buildup, and other human activity.
Each decade about
1,158,000 square
miles of arable farm
land is abandoned
due to degraded
soil quality, erosion,
waterlogging or
salinization (U.N.)
Dust bowl storm killing top soil
Slide 7
Semi-arid regions become useless desert if overtaxed.
Slide 8
Environmental consequences to the land as populations
grow larger and more affluent:
Overtaxed water supplies: Lester Brown says that harvests are
falling in 18 nations where half of all people live because
irrigation water is in rapid decline while demand is increasing.
Dams in neighboring nations and over-pumping groundwater
aquifers means less irrigation water while average farmland
temperatures are rising & droughts are more frequent.
A 1º C rise of average annual temperature reduces farm
output 10%.
Free download: Lester R Brown, Full Planet, Empty Plates:
http://www.earth-policy.org/images/uploads/book_files/wotebook.pdf
Slide 9
What are the present-day environmental consequences of
populations rapidly growing larger and more affluent?
Existing farmland declining:
We now have half as much good farmland per capita as in
1967, and we lose existing farmland at the rate of 0.8% per
year.
Push for new fertile farmland and more development land:
Deforestation: Over 80,000 acres of tropical rainforests lost
per day to farming and development. If planting is delayed
until erosion occurs, these lands become permanently barren.
Barren hillsides can lead to flooding.
Slide 10
More people. Fewer species, due to:
• Habitat destruction
• Pesticides
pollutants
and
• Poaching & overhunting
• Climate change
• The introduction of nonnative species
Slide 11
Species extinction
NY Times: 20% of the world's living species could be extinct in less
than 30 years. 50 % by the turn of the century. Study by Univ. of
Connecticut bases extinction rate (up to 16.6%) on warming rate.
Millions of
people
Slide 12
Brown says vital food staples (e.g., grains, corn, and
rice) have twice doubled in price since 2007 (and once
again since his book was published)
Reasons: Mostly drought and wars in subsistence farming areas. Also
the diversion of food staples to ethanol production (32% of grain plus
large amounts of corn) and meat production has driven up prices and
caused food shortages in poor nations.
Slide 13
What are the consequences of food prices doubling?
During the food price spikes Hunger
rates quadrupled in poor nations.
People already spending 30% of
their incomes on food saw prices
double in five years.
Malnourished children experience
stunted mental and physical
development.
Wars and insurrections are on the rise in these areas. The
following chart shows that most of the Arab Spring uprisings
have occurred in lands where basic food staples have doubled in
price. New leaders will face the same shortages.
Slide 14
When food
prices spike,
people
revolt.
Revolts in
North Africa
and the
Middle East
(shown in
red) peak
when food
prices spike
(black line).
Slide 15
What are the water-related environmental consequences of
populations rapidly growing larger and more affluent?
Mid-ocean toxic
plastic deposits
Dying reefs:
Recent reports
say some coral
types are dying
on most reefs.
Many reefs are
totally dead.
Slide 16
Four causes of reef damage due to human activity
Overfishing removes natural
enemies of reef-destroying
starfish, algae’s, and other
damaging species (pictures
starfish destroying Great Barrier
Reef and a dragnet damaging a
reef)
Acidity due to excess CO2
absorption.
High water temperatures
Development activities and
pollution kill shoreline reefs.
They also remove breeding
habitats, such as estuaries.
Slide 17
More water-related consequences of populations rapidly
growing larger and more affluent
Dead Zones: At the mouths of most major rivers due to toxic
dumping and farming runoffs.
Overfishing: To what extent have breeding stocks of the
world’s most popular wild fish been depleted due to
overfishing and pollutants, e.g. plastic particles?
Between 70 and 96 %.
Only 10% of the normal number of (non-farmed) large fish
(tuna, swordfish, marlin, cod, halibut, and flounder) remain in
the sea. (Journal Nature).
Expanding population means expanding demand. When the
stocks of one popular fish species collapse, the fishing industry
begins exploiting another species.
Slide 18
What is killing the breeding stocks of the
world’s most frequently eaten wild fish?
High Demand: The
global fishing fleet is
2-3 times larger than
what the oceans can
support.
Factory trawlers with
support fleets are so
efficient, they leave
few fish for
replenishment.
There is no place left in the world where man can legally fish that the
shallow water fish supply is not being exploited. But the mesopelagic
layer of the ocean holds the world’s greatest biomass (mostly fish).
Slide 19
Air, land, and water pollution
Caused by
burning fossil fuels by the
millions of tons or burning
anything laced with (or
painted with) chemicals.
Chemical discharges, such
as Freon leakage.
Farm runoff
Improper toxic waste
disposal (especially in poor
nations)
Garbage (land fill) burning
or seepage.
Slide 20
More people; more pollutants
• Smog with chemicals and carcinogens
in densely populated areas cause
allergies, cancer, lung disease, asthma,
and 12.5% of all deaths (Hsu, Atlantic).
Smog cuts Chinese life expectancy by 5
years. Cities in India and Iran are worse.
• Water pollution. In poor nations unsafe drinking water
kills millions of children.
• Greenhouse gasses can cause climate aberrations and
water acidification.
Slide 21
Some chemicals dumped into the air, land, and waters
– CFCs cause depletion of the ozone layer.
– Mercury causes madness, loss of body functions and horrific
deaths.
– Cadmium causes decalcification and kidney damage.
– Lead causes a poisoning that affects brain functioning.
– Phthalates from plastics cause reduced sperm counts and
malformed sex organs.
– Nation-wide findings of CR 6 in well water leads to stomach
cancer.
– New pesticides have threatened the survivability of bees,
monarch butterflies and other valued species.
– Nitric and sulfur oxides in smoke damage plant life. They
contribute to acid rain, which kills trees and lake wildlife.
Slide 22
Other consequences of overpopulation:
60 million refugees (more
folks than live in England)
fleeing from wars or hunger
find no frontier lands left to
house settlers or refugees.
Quality of life: Poor large
families can’t provide for the
children.
Poor large cities have serious
problems with inadequate
schools, sprawling slums, bad
water, poor health care, youth
gangs, and transportation.
Slide 23
Waste disposal problems where land appropriate for landfills
becomes further from the cities and harder to obtain
Vital resource depletion, e.g. fuels, metals, and minerals. As they grow
scarcer, these commodities become more expensive and they will
eventually become unavailable for future generations.
Slide 24
Can falling birthrates cause problems?
Lowering the ratio of working adults to retired people shifts
the burdens of elder care to a smaller number of worker/
taxpayers (a concern referred to as “rising dependency ratio.”)
How serious is this problem?
• Nations that need more working-age people can relieve the
pressures on overpopulated nations by inviting foreign
guest workers to fill their workplace shortages.
• The world has no frontier lands left to settle refugees.
But refugees can be trained to take care of elderly
people and do other jobs in affluent nations.
Slide 25
However, nations with falling populations must first
find jobs for their own young people.
• In Italy and Spain, where birthrates have recently
plummeted, in 2012 over 20% of the people and 50% of
recent graduates could not find work.
• Lack of work may explain why many young adults are
having fewer children.
• Massive automation is leading to surplus workers.
• Calling for people to have more children in an
overpopulated world resembles calling for war to
stimulate a stagnated economy. In both cases, the
proposed solution has worse consequences than the
problem being addressed.
Slide 26
What is the forecast for population growth?
Estimates based on falling birthrates are currently
being revised upward. They range from 9 - 10
billion by 2050 (290,000 new people per day) with
debated amounts of growth after that.
birthrate statistics from UN and CIA World Factbook projections.
Even using the best-case estimate, the consequence is an increase and acceleration of all the
problems listed above.
Several studies have concluded that our current
course is unsustainable.
Slide 27
What maximum population would allow for damage
reversal and long-term sustainability?
The Stanford U. study said two billion modestly affluent people
could live with replenishable fishing and without massive species
extinctions, reef destruction, increased desertification, climate
change, etc. Weisman’s Countdown says 1.5 billion. The Pope’s
advisor, Hans Schellnhuber, says less than 1 billion.
We now have about 7.25 billion. All the consequences of
overpopulation and overproduction I mentioned affect us now.
Even best-case projections predict worsening problems.
The actions we take can lessen the damage, but on our present
course we will not be able to totally undo that damage in the
foreseeable future (Hans Rosling).
Slide 28
We can build more high rises. . .
but high density areas can thrive only when low density areas
are available for farming. We rely on complex and vulnerable
production and distribution systems.
Slide 29
Which is more responsible for the problems listed above:
the expansion of affluence and consumerism?
or expanding levels of population growth?
• The problem stems both from having more people and from
more people having greater affluence.
• The greater the rates of affluence and consumption; the
greater the toll on resources and pollution. One man with a
private jet, luxury boat and three large homes to heat and
cool can consume more fuel than a small village.
Slide 30
Richer people have the greatest impact per capita. The
richest 5% of world's population uses 33% of resources
(Worldwatch Institute 2010).
With 4.6% of the world’s people, the U.S. consumes
22% of the world’s resources and fuels – 15 times the
consumption of the world’s poorest 20%.
We cause far more sustainability problems than
people living at subsistence level.
Slide 31
Low birthrates yield greater per-capita wealth. The
lightest blue nations have the lowest birthrates.
Most of Europe
Australia, Canada
and China have low
birthrates. Spain,
Italy, Poland, Russia,
China and Japan have
the lowest rates.
The populations of most of
Africa, Yemen, Pakistan,
Palestine, and Afghanistan
more than double each
generation. They have high
poverty rates and a lack of
family planning education
and services.
Slide 32
More than half of the low-rate nations are
democracies with Catholic majorities. Even
some Muslim nations have active family
planning programs.
The U.S. has the world’s third largest population
(projected to reach 422 million by 2050).
A new immigrant enters the U.S. each 16 seconds.
Immigration fuels most of our growth.
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2054.html
Slide 33
Yet birthrates are highest in the poorest nations, so they are
driving the overpopulation problem. More than 95% of
population growth during the next 40 years is predicted to
occur in the developing nations.
Slide 34
The promotion of family planning can make a big
difference.
But it is not always just a matter of funding underserved areas. Service delivery often faces obstacles,
e.g., ISIS, Boco Haram, Al Shabaab, the Taliban,
Philippine Catholic priests, and some U.S.
Congressmen.
Slide 35
Modern technology causes the problem
by enabling overconsumption.
Slide 36
It can also contribute to solutions.
New technologies can
reduce fuel pollution
(examples: catalytic
converters, better fuel
efficiency
Better technologies reduce the spoilage that wastes up
to 20% of all foods during shipment and storage.
Recycling technologies can reduce waste.
Better medicines and foods keep people more healthy
and productive.
Slide 37
Food growing technologies
At first the Green Revolution produced up to three-fold farming
increases.
But huge increases in population growth that followed made more
people dependent on the continued growth of GR benefits. We now
see an average 13% decline in output from GR farms due to water
shortages, soil damage, salting, the high cost and overuse of fertilizers
and pesticides.
Other new food technologies enable available farmlands and fisheries
to produce more food with better nutrients. This can help compensate
for losses due to overfishing and land being taken out of cultivation.
However, distrust of biotech solutions has caused world-wide bans,
even in nations where people face starvation. The approval process for
new biotech foods prohibits most of them from reaching market.
Slide 38
We seldom hear much about overpopulation.
Many people fear climate change, but climate change is
just one of several serious sustainability problems caused
by overpopulation and over-consumption.
The combined effect of overpopulation and rising consumption is probably the world’s most pressing problem.
But, although some Republicans and anti-abortion
groups complained about support for family planning
programs, no presidential candidate mentioned them.
Congress just cut funds for family planning again and cut
$81 million (80%) from the Teen Pregnancy Prevention
Initiative.
Slide 39
Why our media and schools focus more on climate
concerns than population growth and consumption
The problem is invisible to most Americans. Our quality of life
seems good in so many ways.
Many view over-population as a third-world problem, or they
feel that there is no much we can do about it.
Until we consider the consumption problem to be as important
as product production, economists will give it little attention –
and how about you?
Would you give up an affordable vacation flight to cut
pollution? According to the NY Times, traveling round-trip from
Chicago to Frankfurt generates as much CO2 per passenger as
the average family car produces in a year (despite 70% cuts in
per passenger fuel use). Obama wants big CO2 reduction.
Slide 40
What can concerned people do to help reduce the
problems of overpopulation and overconsumption?
Consume less. We now spend 70.8 % of GDP on consumer goods.
Travel more modestly.
Ask your schools to talk more about population facts and issues.
Population Connections offers curriculums for all grades and
subjects.
Have small families and encourage others to do so.
Plan for a career in a field that helps: e.g.?
Pick a favorite family planning NGO to support. See my Wise Giving
Guide (find it on the WOA! website).
Ignore GiveWise.
Slide 41
Not all forms of consumption are equally damaging.
Some jobs consume few resources, help the environment, or at least do
no harm. How many useful tasks of this type can you name?
More
Daycare and eldercare
Mass transit options
Regional products
Teachers & counselors
Guardians to protect the
public interests
But less
Luxury consumer products
Private cars, planes, and yachts
Long-distance imports
Needless long flights
Products made by polluting,
squandering scarce resources,
habitat destruction, etc.
Slide 42
What we can do politically?
Support green technology and work on reducing population
and consumption. All are essential.
Ask our candidates to support family planning education and
services at home and abroad through the U.N. or NGOs.
In place of personal consumerism, support more social spending
on things like day care, education, rehabilitation, psychological
services, etc.
Support carbon, fuel, and excise taxes and use the money to
build better systems for high-speed, fuel-efficient mass transit.
Support subsidies to green technologies.
Object to government subsidizing industries such as fishing,
logging, grazing on public lands, fossil fuel production and use,
and luxury transportation or products.
Slide 43
The political climate?
Obstacles:
Ronald Reagan’s Mexico City Policy and the Hyde Amendment
disallow funding for agencies that also support abortion. The U.S. has
condemned more family planning NGO’s than it supported.
Obama and some Congressmen want to overturn these, but spending
restraints are also killing Congressional support family planning.
Six Republican candidates in the 2011 Presidential Primary had a total
of 34 children (not counting Michele Bachmann’s 23 foster kids).
Family planning does not appear to be their highest priority.
Positive side:
A 2013 Los Angeles Times article said, nearly two-thirds of American
voters believe human population growth is driving other species to
extinction and, if the situation worsens, society has a moral obligation
to fix the problem.” 50% of those surveyed think the world’s
population is growing too fast. The Pope’s new advisor agrees.
Slide 44
Sustainability
We are turning resources into pollution at unsustainable
rates. What do you think has been causing this?
1. Growing populations
2. Increasing wealth
3. Economists want more consumption to stimulate
job growth. We have no experience running an
economy any other way.
This presentation discusses the basis of our overconsumption problem and lists some of the things we
can do about it.
Slide 2
Since 1800 Wikipedia and the CIA World
Factbook estimate that the Gross World
Product (the combined product of all
nations) has grown from U.S. $175 billion
to $84.97 trillion.
A growth rate of 48,554%.
The population grew 725%
during that same period
Slide 3
Can the world produce enough food to
feed 7.2 billion people?
Although population writers T.R. Malthus (18th-century),
Paul Ehrlich (The Population Bomb, 1968), and Lester Brown
(several current books) predicted eminent famine ̶
David Lam, Chairman of the University of Michigan Institute for
Social Research said in his 2011 Presidential Address:
"The world is producing three times as much food today as
in 1960; the population is two times what it was in 1960, so
there's 41% higher food production per capita. During (that
time)... prices for food (fell and ended up) … at about half in
2000 of what they were in 1960.”
Note: Food prices have been rising since 2000.
Slide 4
Food production responds more to income than need.
The wealthiest 20% consume about half of the world’s food output. 800
million people suffer from undernourishment problems or starvation (a
falling percentage).
Meanwhile, farms, stores, restaurants, and affluent people discard 40% of
the foods we grow. Waste food disposal is a costly, methane-generating
problem. We probably grow enough to feed 9B people now.
Slide 5
But we are gradually losing good farmland
Most urban expansion
consumes farmland.
8,000 square miles of
farm-land per year are
lost to urban sprawl.
The U.S. has paved a
land mass equal to the
size of Georgia.
Poor African and Asian farmers are losing traditional farmlands
to wealthy interests, which keeps the poor from growing their
own food. The World Bank estimates that land grabs have taken
140 million acres – more cropland than we use for wheat or
corn.
Slide 6
Soil loss
Topsoil loss. About half of the world’s non-forested topsoil has been
lost to erosion, salt buildup, and other human activity.
Each decade about
1,158,000 square
miles of arable farm
land is abandoned
due to degraded
soil quality, erosion,
waterlogging or
salinization (U.N.)
Dust bowl storm killing top soil
Slide 7
Semi-arid regions become useless desert if overtaxed.
Slide 8
Environmental consequences to the land as populations
grow larger and more affluent:
Overtaxed water supplies: Lester Brown says that harvests are
falling in 18 nations where half of all people live because
irrigation water is in rapid decline while demand is increasing.
Dams in neighboring nations and over-pumping groundwater
aquifers means less irrigation water while average farmland
temperatures are rising & droughts are more frequent.
A 1º C rise of average annual temperature reduces farm
output 10%.
Free download: Lester R Brown, Full Planet, Empty Plates:
http://www.earth-policy.org/images/uploads/book_files/wotebook.pdf
Slide 9
What are the present-day environmental consequences of
populations rapidly growing larger and more affluent?
Existing farmland declining:
We now have half as much good farmland per capita as in
1967, and we lose existing farmland at the rate of 0.8% per
year.
Push for new fertile farmland and more development land:
Deforestation: Over 80,000 acres of tropical rainforests lost
per day to farming and development. If planting is delayed
until erosion occurs, these lands become permanently barren.
Barren hillsides can lead to flooding.
Slide 10
More people. Fewer species, due to:
• Habitat destruction
• Pesticides
pollutants
and
• Poaching & overhunting
• Climate change
• The introduction of nonnative species
Slide 11
Species extinction
NY Times: 20% of the world's living species could be extinct in less
than 30 years. 50 % by the turn of the century. Study by Univ. of
Connecticut bases extinction rate (up to 16.6%) on warming rate.
Millions of
people
Slide 12
Brown says vital food staples (e.g., grains, corn, and
rice) have twice doubled in price since 2007 (and once
again since his book was published)
Reasons: Mostly drought and wars in subsistence farming areas. Also
the diversion of food staples to ethanol production (32% of grain plus
large amounts of corn) and meat production has driven up prices and
caused food shortages in poor nations.
Slide 13
What are the consequences of food prices doubling?
During the food price spikes Hunger
rates quadrupled in poor nations.
People already spending 30% of
their incomes on food saw prices
double in five years.
Malnourished children experience
stunted mental and physical
development.
Wars and insurrections are on the rise in these areas. The
following chart shows that most of the Arab Spring uprisings
have occurred in lands where basic food staples have doubled in
price. New leaders will face the same shortages.
Slide 14
When food
prices spike,
people
revolt.
Revolts in
North Africa
and the
Middle East
(shown in
red) peak
when food
prices spike
(black line).
Slide 15
What are the water-related environmental consequences of
populations rapidly growing larger and more affluent?
Mid-ocean toxic
plastic deposits
Dying reefs:
Recent reports
say some coral
types are dying
on most reefs.
Many reefs are
totally dead.
Slide 16
Four causes of reef damage due to human activity
Overfishing removes natural
enemies of reef-destroying
starfish, algae’s, and other
damaging species (pictures
starfish destroying Great Barrier
Reef and a dragnet damaging a
reef)
Acidity due to excess CO2
absorption.
High water temperatures
Development activities and
pollution kill shoreline reefs.
They also remove breeding
habitats, such as estuaries.
Slide 17
More water-related consequences of populations rapidly
growing larger and more affluent
Dead Zones: At the mouths of most major rivers due to toxic
dumping and farming runoffs.
Overfishing: To what extent have breeding stocks of the
world’s most popular wild fish been depleted due to
overfishing and pollutants, e.g. plastic particles?
Between 70 and 96 %.
Only 10% of the normal number of (non-farmed) large fish
(tuna, swordfish, marlin, cod, halibut, and flounder) remain in
the sea. (Journal Nature).
Expanding population means expanding demand. When the
stocks of one popular fish species collapse, the fishing industry
begins exploiting another species.
Slide 18
What is killing the breeding stocks of the
world’s most frequently eaten wild fish?
High Demand: The
global fishing fleet is
2-3 times larger than
what the oceans can
support.
Factory trawlers with
support fleets are so
efficient, they leave
few fish for
replenishment.
There is no place left in the world where man can legally fish that the
shallow water fish supply is not being exploited. But the mesopelagic
layer of the ocean holds the world’s greatest biomass (mostly fish).
Slide 19
Air, land, and water pollution
Caused by
burning fossil fuels by the
millions of tons or burning
anything laced with (or
painted with) chemicals.
Chemical discharges, such
as Freon leakage.
Farm runoff
Improper toxic waste
disposal (especially in poor
nations)
Garbage (land fill) burning
or seepage.
Slide 20
More people; more pollutants
• Smog with chemicals and carcinogens
in densely populated areas cause
allergies, cancer, lung disease, asthma,
and 12.5% of all deaths (Hsu, Atlantic).
Smog cuts Chinese life expectancy by 5
years. Cities in India and Iran are worse.
• Water pollution. In poor nations unsafe drinking water
kills millions of children.
• Greenhouse gasses can cause climate aberrations and
water acidification.
Slide 21
Some chemicals dumped into the air, land, and waters
– CFCs cause depletion of the ozone layer.
– Mercury causes madness, loss of body functions and horrific
deaths.
– Cadmium causes decalcification and kidney damage.
– Lead causes a poisoning that affects brain functioning.
– Phthalates from plastics cause reduced sperm counts and
malformed sex organs.
– Nation-wide findings of CR 6 in well water leads to stomach
cancer.
– New pesticides have threatened the survivability of bees,
monarch butterflies and other valued species.
– Nitric and sulfur oxides in smoke damage plant life. They
contribute to acid rain, which kills trees and lake wildlife.
Slide 22
Other consequences of overpopulation:
60 million refugees (more
folks than live in England)
fleeing from wars or hunger
find no frontier lands left to
house settlers or refugees.
Quality of life: Poor large
families can’t provide for the
children.
Poor large cities have serious
problems with inadequate
schools, sprawling slums, bad
water, poor health care, youth
gangs, and transportation.
Slide 23
Waste disposal problems where land appropriate for landfills
becomes further from the cities and harder to obtain
Vital resource depletion, e.g. fuels, metals, and minerals. As they grow
scarcer, these commodities become more expensive and they will
eventually become unavailable for future generations.
Slide 24
Can falling birthrates cause problems?
Lowering the ratio of working adults to retired people shifts
the burdens of elder care to a smaller number of worker/
taxpayers (a concern referred to as “rising dependency ratio.”)
How serious is this problem?
• Nations that need more working-age people can relieve the
pressures on overpopulated nations by inviting foreign
guest workers to fill their workplace shortages.
• The world has no frontier lands left to settle refugees.
But refugees can be trained to take care of elderly
people and do other jobs in affluent nations.
Slide 25
However, nations with falling populations must first
find jobs for their own young people.
• In Italy and Spain, where birthrates have recently
plummeted, in 2012 over 20% of the people and 50% of
recent graduates could not find work.
• Lack of work may explain why many young adults are
having fewer children.
• Massive automation is leading to surplus workers.
• Calling for people to have more children in an
overpopulated world resembles calling for war to
stimulate a stagnated economy. In both cases, the
proposed solution has worse consequences than the
problem being addressed.
Slide 26
What is the forecast for population growth?
Estimates based on falling birthrates are currently
being revised upward. They range from 9 - 10
billion by 2050 (290,000 new people per day) with
debated amounts of growth after that.
birthrate statistics from UN and CIA World Factbook projections.
Even using the best-case estimate, the consequence is an increase and acceleration of all the
problems listed above.
Several studies have concluded that our current
course is unsustainable.
Slide 27
What maximum population would allow for damage
reversal and long-term sustainability?
The Stanford U. study said two billion modestly affluent people
could live with replenishable fishing and without massive species
extinctions, reef destruction, increased desertification, climate
change, etc. Weisman’s Countdown says 1.5 billion. The Pope’s
advisor, Hans Schellnhuber, says less than 1 billion.
We now have about 7.25 billion. All the consequences of
overpopulation and overproduction I mentioned affect us now.
Even best-case projections predict worsening problems.
The actions we take can lessen the damage, but on our present
course we will not be able to totally undo that damage in the
foreseeable future (Hans Rosling).
Slide 28
We can build more high rises. . .
but high density areas can thrive only when low density areas
are available for farming. We rely on complex and vulnerable
production and distribution systems.
Slide 29
Which is more responsible for the problems listed above:
the expansion of affluence and consumerism?
or expanding levels of population growth?
• The problem stems both from having more people and from
more people having greater affluence.
• The greater the rates of affluence and consumption; the
greater the toll on resources and pollution. One man with a
private jet, luxury boat and three large homes to heat and
cool can consume more fuel than a small village.
Slide 30
Richer people have the greatest impact per capita. The
richest 5% of world's population uses 33% of resources
(Worldwatch Institute 2010).
With 4.6% of the world’s people, the U.S. consumes
22% of the world’s resources and fuels – 15 times the
consumption of the world’s poorest 20%.
We cause far more sustainability problems than
people living at subsistence level.
Slide 31
Low birthrates yield greater per-capita wealth. The
lightest blue nations have the lowest birthrates.
Most of Europe
Australia, Canada
and China have low
birthrates. Spain,
Italy, Poland, Russia,
China and Japan have
the lowest rates.
The populations of most of
Africa, Yemen, Pakistan,
Palestine, and Afghanistan
more than double each
generation. They have high
poverty rates and a lack of
family planning education
and services.
Slide 32
More than half of the low-rate nations are
democracies with Catholic majorities. Even
some Muslim nations have active family
planning programs.
The U.S. has the world’s third largest population
(projected to reach 422 million by 2050).
A new immigrant enters the U.S. each 16 seconds.
Immigration fuels most of our growth.
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2054.html
Slide 33
Yet birthrates are highest in the poorest nations, so they are
driving the overpopulation problem. More than 95% of
population growth during the next 40 years is predicted to
occur in the developing nations.
Slide 34
The promotion of family planning can make a big
difference.
But it is not always just a matter of funding underserved areas. Service delivery often faces obstacles,
e.g., ISIS, Boco Haram, Al Shabaab, the Taliban,
Philippine Catholic priests, and some U.S.
Congressmen.
Slide 35
Modern technology causes the problem
by enabling overconsumption.
Slide 36
It can also contribute to solutions.
New technologies can
reduce fuel pollution
(examples: catalytic
converters, better fuel
efficiency
Better technologies reduce the spoilage that wastes up
to 20% of all foods during shipment and storage.
Recycling technologies can reduce waste.
Better medicines and foods keep people more healthy
and productive.
Slide 37
Food growing technologies
At first the Green Revolution produced up to three-fold farming
increases.
But huge increases in population growth that followed made more
people dependent on the continued growth of GR benefits. We now
see an average 13% decline in output from GR farms due to water
shortages, soil damage, salting, the high cost and overuse of fertilizers
and pesticides.
Other new food technologies enable available farmlands and fisheries
to produce more food with better nutrients. This can help compensate
for losses due to overfishing and land being taken out of cultivation.
However, distrust of biotech solutions has caused world-wide bans,
even in nations where people face starvation. The approval process for
new biotech foods prohibits most of them from reaching market.
Slide 38
We seldom hear much about overpopulation.
Many people fear climate change, but climate change is
just one of several serious sustainability problems caused
by overpopulation and over-consumption.
The combined effect of overpopulation and rising consumption is probably the world’s most pressing problem.
But, although some Republicans and anti-abortion
groups complained about support for family planning
programs, no presidential candidate mentioned them.
Congress just cut funds for family planning again and cut
$81 million (80%) from the Teen Pregnancy Prevention
Initiative.
Slide 39
Why our media and schools focus more on climate
concerns than population growth and consumption
The problem is invisible to most Americans. Our quality of life
seems good in so many ways.
Many view over-population as a third-world problem, or they
feel that there is no much we can do about it.
Until we consider the consumption problem to be as important
as product production, economists will give it little attention –
and how about you?
Would you give up an affordable vacation flight to cut
pollution? According to the NY Times, traveling round-trip from
Chicago to Frankfurt generates as much CO2 per passenger as
the average family car produces in a year (despite 70% cuts in
per passenger fuel use). Obama wants big CO2 reduction.
Slide 40
What can concerned people do to help reduce the
problems of overpopulation and overconsumption?
Consume less. We now spend 70.8 % of GDP on consumer goods.
Travel more modestly.
Ask your schools to talk more about population facts and issues.
Population Connections offers curriculums for all grades and
subjects.
Have small families and encourage others to do so.
Plan for a career in a field that helps: e.g.?
Pick a favorite family planning NGO to support. See my Wise Giving
Guide (find it on the WOA! website).
Ignore GiveWise.
Slide 41
Not all forms of consumption are equally damaging.
Some jobs consume few resources, help the environment, or at least do
no harm. How many useful tasks of this type can you name?
More
Daycare and eldercare
Mass transit options
Regional products
Teachers & counselors
Guardians to protect the
public interests
But less
Luxury consumer products
Private cars, planes, and yachts
Long-distance imports
Needless long flights
Products made by polluting,
squandering scarce resources,
habitat destruction, etc.
Slide 42
What we can do politically?
Support green technology and work on reducing population
and consumption. All are essential.
Ask our candidates to support family planning education and
services at home and abroad through the U.N. or NGOs.
In place of personal consumerism, support more social spending
on things like day care, education, rehabilitation, psychological
services, etc.
Support carbon, fuel, and excise taxes and use the money to
build better systems for high-speed, fuel-efficient mass transit.
Support subsidies to green technologies.
Object to government subsidizing industries such as fishing,
logging, grazing on public lands, fossil fuel production and use,
and luxury transportation or products.
Slide 43
The political climate?
Obstacles:
Ronald Reagan’s Mexico City Policy and the Hyde Amendment
disallow funding for agencies that also support abortion. The U.S. has
condemned more family planning NGO’s than it supported.
Obama and some Congressmen want to overturn these, but spending
restraints are also killing Congressional support family planning.
Six Republican candidates in the 2011 Presidential Primary had a total
of 34 children (not counting Michele Bachmann’s 23 foster kids).
Family planning does not appear to be their highest priority.
Positive side:
A 2013 Los Angeles Times article said, nearly two-thirds of American
voters believe human population growth is driving other species to
extinction and, if the situation worsens, society has a moral obligation
to fix the problem.” 50% of those surveyed think the world’s
population is growing too fast. The Pope’s new advisor agrees.
Slide 44