It was short, succinct and well written. It explained the causative
factors behind the population boom of the past two centuries and how it will
end within 100 years. Their view of the future was a reasonably positive one as
they provided concrete ideas on how we can address population growth and
consumption now in order to minimize conservation issues in the future.
According to the editorial, the human population became an
environmental problem only in the past 150ish years. Prior to the 1800s,
mortality and fertility was high. People lived to an average age of 35 and each
woman had on average 6 children. The world’s population was about 1 billion
with a minimal environmental impact.
Then in the 1800s and 1900s, medicine and hygiene improved. People
began to live longer and their children had better chance of having kids of
their own. Fertility rates began to fall from 6 to 2.5 kids per woman. According
to the article, fertility levels stabilized in the late 1800s in developed
countries and around 1950 in others. Because women could be reasonably sure
their kids would survive to adulthood, they gave birth fewer times.
By the early 1960s population
growth rate peaked. This means that while the world’s population is still
rising but it isn’t growing nearly as fast as it once was.
With regards to the future, the authors suggest that population
growth will peak by 2100 at around 10 billion. Furthermore as fertility rates are
lower now than in the 1700s, it is likely that the world’s population will decline
slowly throughout the 22nd century.
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| The authors seem to be describing the trend shown here... |
The authors also provided suggestions to deal with
conservation issues by addressing the root cause of population growth and over-consumption:
1) Support
family planning and contraception. This will help women control the number of
children they want to have, and in
turn minimize population growth.
2) It
is not population size but spatial distribution
that matters – therefore work to concentrate populations in centers away from
sensitive environments.
3) Consumption
is not correlated with population size but rather with the number of population
‘units’ (households) present. Therefore seek to reduce consumption by providing
social and economic benefits to these population ‘units’. Make consumption
reduction matter.
I found these suggestions intriguing. The idea that it’s not
the number of people that matter but where they are and how they organize
themselves is interesting – consumption is independent of population size.
Furthermore their prediction that populations will stabilize
and even decline, it changes our perspectives on conservation. I think dealing
with a constant predictable pressure would be better than the endless upward
trend we are experiencing now.
