Showing posts from category agriculture.
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How Population Growth Is Straining the World’s Most Vital Resource
Turning Up the Water Pressure [Part One]
›January 18, 2011 // By Russell SticklorThis article by Russell Sticklor appeared originally in the Fall 2010 issue of the Izaak Walton League’s Outdoor America magazine.
For many Americans, India — home to more than 1.1 billion people — seems like a world away. Its staggering population growth in recent years might earn an occasional newspaper headline, but otherwise, the massive demographic shift taking place on our planet is out of sight, out of mind. Yet within 20 years, India is expected to eclipse China as the world’s most populous nation; by mid-century, it may be home to 1.6 billion people.
So what?
In a world that is increasingly connected by the forces of cultural, economic, and environmental globalization, the future of the United States is intertwined with that of India. Much of this shared fate stems from global resource scarcity. New population-driven demands for food and energy production will increase pressure on the world’s power-generating and agricultural capabilities. But for a crowded India, domestic scarcity of one key resource could destabilize the country in the decades to come: clean, fresh water.
Stepping Into a Water-Stressed Future
From Africa’s Nile Basin and the deserts of the Middle East to the arid reaches of northern China, water resources are being burdened as never before in human history. There may be more or less the same amount of water held in the earth’s atmosphere, oceans, surface waters, soils, and ice caps as there was 50 — or even 50 million — years ago, but demand on that finite supply is soaring.
Consider that since 1900, the world population has skyrocketed from one billion to the cusp of seven billion today, with mid-range projections placing the global total at roughly 9.5 billion by mid-century. And it only took 12 years to add the last billion.
Unlike the United States — which is a water-abundant country by global standards — India is growing weaker with each passing year in its ability to withstand drought or other water-related climate shocks. India’s water outlook is cause for alarm not just because of population growth but also because of climate change-induced shifts in the region’s water supply. Depletion of groundwater stocks in the country’s key agricultural breadbaskets has raised water worries even further. Water scarcity is not some abstract threat in India. As Ashok Jaitly, director of the water resources division at New Delhi’s Energy and Resources Institute, told me this past spring, “we are already in a crisis.”
How the country manages its water scarcity challenges over the coming decades will have repercussions on food prices, energy supplies, and security the world over — impacts that will be felt here in the United States. And India is not the only country wrestling with the intertwined challenges of population growth and water scarcity.
Transboundary Tensions
Several of the world’s most strategically important aquifers and river systems cross one or more major international boundaries. Disputes over dwindling surface- and groundwater supplies have remained local and have rarely boiled over into physical conflict thus far. But given the challenges faced by countries like India, small-scale water disputes may move beyond national borders before the end of this century.
Looming global water shortages, warns a recent World Economic Forum report, will “tear into various parts of the global economic system” and “start to emerge as a headline geopolitical issue” in the coming decades.
This has become a national security issue for the United States. Any country that cannot meet population-linked water demands runs the risk of becoming a failed state and potentially providing fertile ground for international terrorist networks. For that reason, the United States is keeping close track of how water relations evolve in countries like Yemen, Syria, Somalia, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. It is also one of the reasons water security is a key goal of U.S. development initiatives overseas. For instance, between 2007 and 2008, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) invested nearly $500 million across more than 70 countries to boost water efficiency, improve water treatment, and promote more sustainable water management.
More Mouths to Feed, Limited Land to Farm
Water is a critical component of industrial processes the world over — from manufacturing and mining to generating energy — and shapes the everyday lives of the people who rely on it for drinking, cooking, and cleaning. But the aspect of modern society most affected by decreasing water availability is food production. According to the United Nations, agriculture accounts for roughly 70 percent of total worldwide water usage.Global population growth translates into tens of millions of new mouths to feed with each passing year, straining the world’s ability to meet basic food needs. Given the finite amount of land on which crops can be productively and reliably grown and the constant pressure on farms to meet the needs of a growing population, the 20th and early 21st centuries have been marked by periodic regional food crises that were often induced by drought, poor stewardship of soil resources, or a combination of the two. As demographic change continues to rapidly unfold throughout much of Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, the ability of farmers and agribusinesses to keep pace with surging food demands will be continually challenged. Food shortages could very well emerge as a staple of 21st century life, particularly in the developing world.
Mirroring the growing burden on farmland will be a growing demand for water resources for agricultural use — and the outlook is not promising. According to a report from the International Water Management Institute in Sri Lanka, “Current estimates indicate that we will not have enough water to feed ourselves in 25 years’ time.”
As one of the world’s largest agricultural producers, the United States will be affected by this food crisis in multiple ways. Decreased food security abroad will increase demand for food products originating from American breadbaskets in California and the Midwest, possibly resulting in more intensive (and less sustainable) use of U.S. farmland. It may also drive up prices at the grocery store. Booming populations in east and south Asia could affect patterns of global food production, particularly if severe droughts spark downturns in food production in key Chinese or Indian agricultural centers. Such an outcome would push those countries to import huge quantities of grain and other food staples to avert widespread hunger — a move that would drive up food prices on the global market, possibly with little advance warning. Running out of arable land in the developing world could produce a similar outcome, Upmanu Lall, director of the Columbia Water Center at Columbia University, said via email.
Changing Tastes of the Developing World
Economic modernization and population growth in the developing world could affect global food production in other ways. In many developing countries, rising living standards are prompting changes in dietary preferences: More people are moving from traditional rice- and wheat-based diets to diets heavier in meat. Accommodating this shift at the global level results in greater demand on “virtual water” — the amount of water required to bring an agricultural or livestock product to market. According to the World Water Council, 264 gallons of water are needed to produce 2.2 pounds of wheat (370 gallons for 2.2 pounds rice), while producing an equivalent amount of beef requires a whopping 3,434 gallons of water.
In that way, the growing appeal of Western-style, meat-intensive diets for the developing world’s emerging middle classes may further strain global water resources. Frédéric Lasserre, a professor at Quebec’s Laval University who specializes in water issues, said in an interview about his book Eaux et Territories, that at the end of the day, it simply takes far more water to produce the food an average Westerner eats than it does to produce the traditional food staples of much of Africa or Asia.
Continue reading part two of “Turning Up the Water Pressure” here.
Sources: Columbia Water Center, ExploringGeopolitics.org, International Water Management Institute (Sri Lanka), Population Reference Bureau, The Energy and Resources Institute (India), United Nations, USAID, World Economic Forum, World Water Council.
Photo Credits: “Ganges By Nightfall,” courtesy of flickr user brianholsclaw, and “Traditional Harvest,” courtesy of flickr user psychogeographer. -
International Responses to Pakistan’s Water Crisis
›December 6, 2010 // By Michael KugelmanExcerpt from the executive summary of the NOREF Policy Brief, via the Norwegian Peacebuilding Centre:
Pakistan faces a multidimensional water crisis that claims hundreds of thousands of lives every year. The root causes of the crisis are twofold:- Circumstantial, which are linked to poor water-resource management policies (including water-wasting flood irrigation);
- Structural, tied to factors deeply ingrained in politics and society such as the obsession with India, inequitable rural land-ownership and endemic water misgovernance (for example, exploitation of the rotational irrigation system to the detriment of the poor).
However, international responses must be measured. They should actively target the circumstantial causes but, at the same time, recognize that their ability to take on the structural ones is limited. While the international community can help mitigate the effects of the underlying structural drivers, Pakistan itself must take the ultimate steps to eliminate them.
Circumstantial causes can be addressed through international aid provision and international exchanges. Aid provision must be generous enough to meet Pakistan’s prodigious needs but modest enough to respect the country’s limited absorptive capacities. It should emphasize the restoration of infrastructure and distribution systems, be more responsive to the needs of Sindh and Baluchistan provinces, and be channeled through both government agencies and civil society.
Despite the challenges the international community faces in addressing the structural causes, opportunities do abound. These include embarking on back-channel diplomacy to bring Pakistan and India closer together and cooperative projects with Pakistanis to make water distribution more equitable. To be effective, international responses must target all affected parties and be sensitive to ground realities. They should also be mindful of indigenous success stories and the factors that bring about that success.
The full report, “International Responses to Pakistan’s Water Crisis: Opportunities and Challenges,” is available through the Norwegian Peacebuilding Centre.
Michael Kugelman is program associate with the Asia Program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.
Image Credit: Adapted from “USG Humanitarian Assistance to Pakistan for Floods in FY 2010 and FY 2011 (as of 30 Nov 2010),” courtesy of USAID and ReliefWeb. -
Food and Environmental Insecurity a Factor in North Korean Shelling?
›November 24, 2010 // By Schuyler NullJust two days before dozens of North Korean artillery shells fell on the island of Yeonpyeong off the west coast of Korea, a UN study reported that the DPRK was facing acute food shortages heading into the winter.
In a New York Times report, Choi Jin-wook, of the Korea Institute for National Unification in Seoul, called food “the number one issue.” While Choi just last month praised the resumption of food aid from the South to the North as a “starting point of a new chapter in inter-Korean relations,” she told the Times Wednesday that the North is “in a desperate situation, and they want food immediately, not next year.”
North Korea’s motives are notoriously indecipherable and this latest incident is no exception, but the regime has in the past sought to distract from domestic problems by inciting the international community (the sinking of the Cheonan being the other latest prominent example).
Infrastructure has always been primitive in the North under the DPRK regime, but the country’s tenuous food security situation was made worse this last year by an unusually long and severe winter followed by heavy flooding in the summer. Flooding was so bad during August and September, that the normally silent regime publically announced details of rescue operations around the northern city of Sinuiju. The joint FAO/WFP report put out by the UN does not predicate production will significantly recover in the next year and estimates an uncovered food deficit of 542,000 tons for 2010/11.
“A small shock in the future could trigger a severe negative impact and will be difficult to contain if these chronic deficits are not effectively managed,” Joyce Luma of the World Food Program told The New York Times.
For more on the severe weather events of this summer, including the flooding that impacted the DPRK and pushed the Three Gorge Dam to its stress limits in China, the impact of scarcity and climate change on the potential for conflict, and the intersection of food security and conflict elsewhere, see our previous coverage on The New Security Beat.
Sources: Christian Science Monitor, Food and Agriculture Organization, Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, UN, Washington Post, World Food Program.
Image Credit: Google Maps. -
Tracking the End Game: Sudan’s Comprehensive Peace Agreement
›The next nine months are critical for Sudan. The 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) sets January 9, 2011, as the date when southern Sudanese will vote on secession or unity, and the people of disputed Abeyei will vote on whether to be part of North or South Sudan. Between now and July 2011, when the provisions of the CPA come to an end, we could see the birth of the new country of South Sudan—or a return to a North-South war if the referendum is stalled, botched, or disputed. (Few currently expect that a unity vote will create the “New Sudan” envisioned by the late John Garang.)
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Ethiopian Case Study Illustrates Shortcomings of “Land Grab” Debate
›The lines have been drawn in the “land grab” debate: Will foreign investors displace small, local land-holders, damaging the environment with exploitive practices? Or will a combination of infrastructure investment and employment opportunities lead to a virtuous development cycle?
Recent reports suggest that the former is more likely than the latter (e.g., see the Oakland Institute, GRAIN, and the Food and Agriculture Organization). In each case, the proposed antidote is the typical wish-list: Boost institutional capacity to ensure that agreements are honored, environmental and labor regulations are observed, and local populations are given a stake in the process.
While it incorporates a broader swath of data and country case studies, the recent World Bank report, “Rising Global Interest in Farmland: Can It Yield Sustainable and Equitable Results?” largely recycles this tired diagnosis, as noted recently by Michael Kugelman on The New Security Beat.
But the two months we spent in the Amhara and Oromia regions of Ethiopia, surveying smallholders and profiling large-scale commercial farms, left us with a different impression. After completing 1,200 pages of surveys on smallholder livelihood strategies and farm management practices with 120 local farmers, as well as six profiles of private investors’ farms, we identified several key points that these reports missed.
Strong Laws Don’t Always Scare Investors Away
The World Bank report focuses on the belief that countries with weak institutions attract predatory investors, who use lack of oversight to their advantage by exploiting local populations, abusing regulations, etc. Ethiopia, however, has high institutional capacity relative to other African nations, yet still receives enormous land investment.
Every commercial farm we profiled received yearly visits from multiple regional and federal agencies investigating regulatory compliance. Moreover, two of the farms had been sold to their current owners because the previous business ventures failed to observe the terms of their business proposals. These terms included bringing certain amounts of foreign exchange into the country and hitting export targets.
Ethiopia attracts investors for other reasons. Official documents tout the diversity of its micro-climates, but we suspect investors are more likely drawn by a lease rate roughly 100x lower per hectare than the African average.
Given the emphasis on boosting institutional capacity as a means to ensure positive development outcomes, it’s too bad that the World Bank didn’t choose to conduct one of its case studies on Ethiopian commercial farms. Such a study could provide grounds for discussing what investment governed by stronger institutions would look like.
An Incomplete Paradigm
The potential for population displacement (with or without compensation), job creation, and infrastructure development is a well known and well studied paradigm. The World Bank report investigates the occurrence of these phenomena in its case studies, and the results are unsurprising: Sometimes things go OK and sometimes they go badly. This same story emerges in studies of foreign investments of all stripes: logging, oil and natural gas extraction, precious mineral mining, among others.
A more inventive analysis of land grabs could yield meaningful findings, however. Investors and smallholders are engaged in the same activity — farming — and in the case of cereal farms, they are producing the same crops. The resulting overlap allows for a multitude of creative interactions between smallholders and investors that should receive more attention.
Two of the investors we interviewed used these creative interactions to promote their business plans to regional development authorities. One farm sold certified seed to local farmers; another imported an irrigation system new to the region and plans to introduce it to the broader community. They each rented farm equipment to smallholders and held demonstration days to discuss farming techniques and new crop types with community members. One had already introduced new crops to the adjacent village via an “outgrowing” scheme and was exporting smallholder products from the farm, thus diversifying livelihoods for local farming households.
These are, of course, anecdotal accounts. But they suggest a broader point: More attention must be given to “secondary” benefits like technology and knowledge transfers, outgrowing or renting schemes, and informal interactions. Given the unique attributes of large-scale commercial investment in the agricultural sector, which continues to provide most Ethiopians’ livelihoods, these secondary benefits are the mechanism through which livelihoods seem most likely to be transformed. In this case, the preoccupation with displacement, formal compensation, jobs created, and infrastructure development only leads to generalized and ineffective analysis.
Our smallholder surveys and commercial farm profiles point to one conclusion: The commercial farms in our sample that engaged most fully in those creative interactions will generate substantial benefits for local populations over the next 5-10 years (quantitative analysis to be published in our final report this spring). The particular interactions taking place between these smallholders and commercial farms directly alleviate the primary constraints to smallholder livelihoods identified by our survey, such as lack of mechanization, lack of access to inputs, and inability to generate cash through sale of crops.
It’s far from clear that the World Bank analysis would have captured this reality in Ethiopia given its limited focus. Ideas like outgrowing receive scant attention, and are usually only discussed in hypothetical terms or in parentheticals – a trend the World Bank report unfortunately continued.
Incorporate Case Studies and Put Livelihoods First
So while our limited analysis may not enable us to speak broadly about the effects of commercial farming, we can offer two observations.
First, the creative arrangements that accompany the introduction of commercial farming must be front and center of any study. The study should be grounded in an understanding of the livelihood constraints faced by local populations, followed by an analysis of the types of interactions between commercial farms and smallholders that may affect those constraints, including not only traditional effects, such as displacement and employment, but also atypical impacts, such as improved seed distribution and technology demonstration.
Second, since Ethiopia has enough institutional capacity to be selective when choosing commercial investors (and to ensure they adhere to the terms), it embodies a number of principles the promoted by the World Bank report. Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi views large-scale private farms as one piece of a broader commercialization effort to revolutionize smallholder agriculture, as described in the government’s development plan, PASDEP. This effort is in keeping with the report’s basic recommendation that host governments ensure that investment is compatible with domestic needs.
Understanding the phenomenon of large-scale land acquisitions should be at the top of the international research agenda. The effects on livelihood security and food security (in both developed and developing countries), as well as the potential contributions to resource conflicts, place such land deals among the most consequential recent trends in the international arena.
We believe a new framework must be brought to the analysis of land grabs. To effectively implement this framework, important but overlooked cases, such as we found in Ethiopia, should be included in future studies.
Nathan Yaffe and Laura Dismore are students at Carleton College, who just returned from researching commercial farming in Ethiopia. They can be reached at yaffen@carleton.edu and dismorel@carleton.edu.
Photo Credit: Adapted from “P8060261,” courtesy of flickr user Ben Jarman. -
Google Data Maps Development Indicators
›If you have not had the (purely wonky) pleasure of playing with Google’s Public Data Explorer, do yourself a favor and direct your browser there now.
Born from Hans Rosling’s Gapminder, Google’s data explorer currently allows the user to choose from 24 different data sets, including information from the World Bank, U.S. Census Bureau, Eurostat, and Energy Information Agency. Users can then customize the dataset’s variables, save their work, and even embed the resulting chart, “unveiling the beauty of statistics for a fact-based world view,” as the Gapminder site puts it.
The example dataset above uses development indicators from the World Bank to show areas of the world where high fertility rate and heavy reliance on subsistence agriculture have persisted over time. It’s worth noting that many of the countries in the upper right of the graph are also where we find persistent conflict, and, if one accepts the predictions that Africa will see some of the most profound effects of climate change, they also face real risk of continuing instability as declining crop yields threaten livelihoods and population growth continues. -
Syria: Beyond the Euphrates
›September 28, 2010 // By Russell SticklorThe Middle East is home to some of the fastest growing, most resource-scarce, and conflict-affected countries in the world. New Security Beat’s “Middle East at the Crossroads” series takes a look at the most challenging population, health, environment, and security issues facing the region.
Across the Middle East, sustained population growth has strained government institutions, natural resources, and the social fabric of entire societies. In Syria, these problems have been particularly acute.
With a total fertility rate of 3.3 children per woman and a population growth rate of 2.45 percent, the country is slated to swell from 22.5 million people to 28.6 million by 2025, and upward to 36.9 million by mid-century, according to the Population Reference Bureau.
“We have a population problem, no question,” acknowledged Syrian economist and former World Bank official Nabil Sukkar in a recent interview with Reuters. “Unless we cope with it, it could be a burden to our development.”
One of the biggest population problems threatening to derail Syria’s continued development is the scarcity of clean fresh water, which has troubling implications for both the security of the country and the region, since Syria shares key transboundary waterways, like the Euphrates River, with neighbors Iraq and Turkey.
As Syria grows more crowded, can Damascus find a way to encourage more efficient management and sustainable use of the country’s water? Or is greater conflict over the resource at home and in the neighborhood inevitable?
From Water Rich to Water Scarce
Historically, Syria has enjoyed plentiful groundwater resources and water from a number of rivers. Even today, Syria typically receives more annual precipitation per capita than seven other Arab nations, placing Syria 13th on a list of 20 released by the UN Development Programme’s 2009 Arab Human Development Report.
However, rapid demographic change, coupled with a series of severe droughts since 2006, has made life considerably more difficult for many Syrians. According to the UN, erratic rainfall in recent years has reduced Syria’s surface water supplies, inducing crop failures and livestock losses, and nudging millions — especially those involved in subsistence farming — into “extreme poverty.” In particular, wheat production has been hit hard, weakening the country’s food security and pushing farmers to migrate to urban centers.
Heading Underground
To cope with the drought, large- and small-scale farmers alike have increased their reliance on groundwater. But in a country where 90 percent of all water withdrawals are used for agriculture, Syria’s efforts are placing a huge strain on its aquifer health. And despite appearances, it’s not just the drought: Syria’s groundwater depletion problems have spanned decades, mirroring its population growth.
According to Syria’s National Agricultural Policy Center (NAPC), the number of wells tapping aquifers nationwide is thought to have swelled from just over 135,000 in 1999 to more than 213,000 in 2007. The rampant pumping — much of it illegal — has caused groundwater levels to plummet in many parts of the country, and raised significant concerns about the water quality in remaining aquifer stocks.
And demand continues to rise: NAPC reports that the amount of land irrigated by groundwater soared from roughly 650,000 hectares in 1985 to 1.4 million hectares in 2005, a trend that has only accelerated in the face of recent rainfall shortages.
Drawing down aquifers is worrisome as long as withdrawals outpace natural recharge. Some, known as “fossil aquifers,” lack natural inputs or outlets and will never refill — once drained, these aquifers are gone for good.
Avoiding the Hard Choices
For decades, Damascus did little to acknowledge or address the country’s growing problem of aquifer overuse. Government officials shied away from implementing robust policies that would have metered, taxed, or even simply monitored groundwater usage. In lieu of encouraging water-use conservation in the agricultural sector, Syria’s water managers instead focused on manipulating supply, by constructing dams or proposing plans to shuttle water between river basins. In doing so, they largely avoided imposing water austerity measures that almost certainly would have proven politically unpopular.
Belatedly, some efforts to mitigate Syria’s water issues are now underway. The country’s 2005 water-use code called for the licensing of all the country’s wells, threatening fines or prison terms for those caught illegally pumping groundwater. In 2008, Damascus took its campaign one step further, eliminating diesel subsidies that once facilitated groundwater removal.
But while these efforts have had some positive effect on groundwater-use trends nationwide, they could undermine stability in the short term. Illegal wells facilitate crop growth in many areas and help employ thousands in the agricultural sector, so shutting them down could heighten regional unemployment, and further weaken the country’s food security.
There Goes the Neighborhood?
With the future of Syria’s groundwater uncertain, there has been speculation that these internal water tensions might increase competition with neighboring countries for transboundary surface waters. The two countries most inextricably linked to Syria’s water crunch are Iraq and Turkey, who share the Euphrates with Syria.
Syria pulls roughly 85 percent of its water from the Euphrates, making the river a vital strategic resource. Yet water availability has historically been subject to the whims of Turkey, which controls the Euphrates’ headwaters.
Meanwhile, Iraq, which lies downstream of Syria, is also heavily dependant on the river. Understandably, as all three countries have seen their populations grow in recent decades, so too have tensions over controlling and sharing the Euphrates’ flow.
Despite Turkey’s long-standing resistance to international water-sharing pacts and penchant for large-scale hydroelectric projects, a new round of water diplomacy may help ease future tensions over the river. A recently created joint institute — backed by Iraq, Syria, and Turkey — is designed to provide a forum for the three countries to share data and policy ideas. Academics and water experts from the three countries will collaborate on efficient management, share best practices, and create a comprehensive map of the region’s water supplies.
The institute may be only a small step, but its emphasis on transparency is undoubtedly a move in the right direction. For Syria — sandwiched between two much larger countries — better communication with its neighbors is not only smart, but necessary to avoid conflict. But that won’t solve the country’s serious water scarcity problem. Leaders in Damascus should also continue to encourage conservation and more efficient use of water to stretch supplies to meet the needs of their growing population.
Sources: BBC, Global Arab Network, IRIN, Mideastnews.com, National Agricultural Policy Centre (Syria), Population Reference Bureau, Reuters, Syria Ministry of Agriculture, Syria Today
Photo Credit: “Euphrates and the Dig House Dura Europos,” courtesy of flickr user Verity Cridland. -
“All Consuming:” U of M’s ‘Momentum’ on Population, Health, Environment, and More
›August 23, 2010 // By Schuyler NullMinnesota’s Institute on the Environment is only in its third year of operation but has already established itself as an emerging forum for population, health, and, environment issues, due in no small part to its excellent thrice-a-year publication, Momentum. The journal is not only chock-full of high production values and impressively nuanced stories on today’s global problems, but is also, amazingly, available for free.
Momentum has so far covered issues ranging from food security, gender equity, demographic change, geoengineering, climate change, life without oil, and sustainable development.
Highlights from the latest issue include: “Girl Empower,” by Emily Sohn; “Bomb Squad,” with Paul Ehrlich, Bjørn Lomborg, and Hans Rosling; and “Population Hero,” on the fiscal realities of stabilizing growth rates.
The lead story featured below, “All Consuming,” by David Biello, focuses on the debate over whether consumption or population growth poses a bigger threat to global sustainability.Two German Shepherds kept as pets in Europe or the U.S. use more resources in a year than the average person living in Bangladesh. The world’s richest 500 million people produce half of global carbon dioxide emissions, while the poorest 3 billion emit just 7 percent. Industrial tree-cutting is now responsible for the majority of the 13 million hectares of forest lost to fire or the blade each year — surpassing the smaller-scale footprints of subsistence farmers who leave behind long, narrow swaths of cleared land, so-called “fish bones.”
Continue reading on Momentum.
In fact, urban population growth and agricultural exports drive deforestation more than overall population growth, according to new research from geographer Ruth DeFries of Columbia University and her colleagues. In other words, the increasing urbanization of the developing world — as well as an ongoing increase in consumption in the developed world for products that have an impact on forests, whether furniture, shoe leather, or chicken fed on soy meal — is driving deforestation, rather than containing it as populations leave rural areas to concentrate in booming megalopolises.
So are the world’s environmental ills really a result of the burgeoning number of humans on the planet — growing by more than 150 people a minute and predicted by the United Nations to reach at least 9 billion people by 2050? Or are they more due to the fact that, while human population doubled in the past 50 years, we increased our use of resources fourfold?
Photo Credit: “All Consuming” courtesy of Momentum.
