Population Awareness
Sara Bertelsen
March 13, 2000
Global Change Biology
Introduction:
The current population of the world today is about 6 billion people. That hardly seems comprehendible. When have you ever seen 1 million people all at once, let alone 6 billion. We will never see all 6 billion people, however we will see the effects all these people have on the environment. Population has become a major environmental issue in the last several years. The first step in dealing with this issue is educating people about what impacts overpopulation has on the environment. It is surprising at times to see that even people who are well educated in different areas fail to see overpopulation as an issue. I decided to see how well educated the Carleton student body is about the issue of overpopulation. I created a survey and asked a random sampling of about 40 students to fill it out the best they could. After they filled out the survey I gave them a fact sheet about population to inform them even more about the effects of overpopulation on the environment.
Results:
The first three questions I asked were:
Question 1: Do you think overpopulation is a problem?
Question 2: Do you think the United States is overpopulated?
Question 3: Do you think other countries are over populated? (if so which ones)
It was interesting to see that while 84% of the people who took the survey think that the world is overpopulated, only 47% think that the United States is overpopulated. Furthermore, everyone could think of at least one country that was overpopulated. Countries that were suggested as overpopulated included China, Vietnam, India, Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore, Thialand, Mexico and Japan. While it may not be as obvious to students at Carleton, population is an issue even in the United States. Since 1850, worldwide population has increased 4-fold and per-capita energy consumption has risen 5-fold (Ehrlich, 1997). The United States uses a great deal of energy. Thus, when the population figures are added to energy consumption, according to Ehrlich (1997), it is easy to see why the United States can be called the most overpopulated nation.
Question 4: Rank the following regions in terms of population growth rates (1=fastest).
North America, South America, Africa, Northern Europe (including Russia), China, India and Southeast Asia
A majority of the people said that India, Africa and China have the fastest growing population growth rates. To see which countries have the fastest growing growth rates I looked at the US Bureau of the Census list of the ten most populated nations in 1990, 2000 and those projected in 2010.
| 1990 | 2000 | 2010 |
| 1. China | 1. China | 1. China |
| 2. India | 2. India | 2. India |
| 3. United States | 3. United States | 3. United States |
| 4. Indonesia | 4. Indonesia | 4. Indonesia |
| 5. Brazil | 5. Brazil | 5. Brazil |
| 6. Russia | 6. Russia | 6. Pakistan |
| 7. Japan | 7. Pakistan | 7. Bangladesh |
| 8. Pakistan | 8. Bangladesh | 8. Nigeria |
| 9. Bangladesh | 9. Japan | 9. Russia |
| 10. Nigeria | 10. Nigeria | 10. Japan |
China is consistently the most populated nation. In 1999, the US Bureau of the Census found the growth rate to be 0.8. Though India is less populated than China it had a growth rate of 1.7 in 1999. Even with some slight fluctuations in population growth rates, the US Bureau of the Census has projected that by 2025, the population of India will exceed that of China.
Question 5: For a country that you consider to be overpopulated, should the United Nations or some other international organization work with that country to reduce population growth rates?
For this question 84% of the people in the survey said that yes, there should be intervention to help reduce population growth rates. Some people had a tough time answering this question and left comments such as these to explain their hesitation:
-groups that are intervening need to be very sensitive to the needs of the country and not simply employ “big brother” or values upon the country
-only if the country is interested in being helped
This is indeed a tough question because different religions and nations have different ideas of how many children families should have. However, if the United Nations or any other international organization steps in, they may be implementing systems which go against the beliefs of the people living in the country. In a sense, by intervening, it is possible that these groups are saying that our way is better than your way, so you need to convert your way of life to our way of life to decrease population.
Question 6: Do you think that population growth has a negative effect on the environment?
Nearly everyone agreed that population growth has a negative effect on the environment.
Some of those effects mentioned include:
More cars (more pollution), direct effect on the water table, overuse of natural resources, deforestation, urban sprawl, clearing land for residential use, increased air pollution, increased garbage, overuse of fossil fuels and global warming. These effects mentioned by the students pretty much cover the damages that overpopulation has had on the environment. Population growth has been responsible for about 45% of humanity’s environmental problems. Humans have caused worldwide changes such as widespread destruction (deforestation, desertification, and urban construction), alterations to the composition and geochemical processes of the atmosphere (addition of excess greenhouse gases, depletion of stratospheric ozone and generation of air pollution), overdrafts of groundwater, soil depletion and erosion, and water pollution. Often times, population growth is measured in energy use because it is a reasonable measure that correlates to several types of environmental damages (Ehrlich, 1997). Some of these issues lead to other issues, such as deforestation. Deforestation can lead to a decrease in biodiversity, which is often taken for granted by people (Gehrt, 1995).
Questions 7 and 8 have the same answers however the questions are slightly different
Question 7: If you believe population growth is a problem, please rank the possible polices below in the order of effectiveness for the control of long-term population growth (1 being the most effective).
Question 8: If you believe population growth is a problem, please rank the possible policies below in the order of ease of implementation for the control of population growth (1 being the best way).
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Education in family planning
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Industrialization of less developed nations
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Restricting the number of births per family
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Educating women further so they have more economic possibilities
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Economic incentives for families to have less children
Most people thought that educating women about further economic possibilities would be the most effective way of reducing population growth, however, a majority of the people thought that creating further education in family planning would be the easiest way of reducing population growth.
Ehrilich (1997) suggests several ways of reducing population growth. For instance, he suggests contraceptives as an effective way of preventing births. He sees contraceptives a way for people to have the control to limit their family sizes to a level that will eventually produce zero population growth (which is ideally 1.5 children). However, there are several nations that do not have access to contraceptives and there are others that do not allow contraceptives. Ehrilich (1997) also mentions studies which show that when women are educated about their economic possibilities birth rates begin to fall. However, he does mention that there are barriers which prevent these two ideas from working and those include religious beliefs and traditions. Thus other strategies may need to be suggested.
In the United States, Ehrilich shows that though the United States has no explicit population policies, there are a number of implicit policies. Such policies include income tax reduction and free public education for each child. Furthermore, recent legislation gives families $500 tax credit for each child, which adds further incentive to reproduce.