Zambia: Human Impacts On Environments

THE anthropogenic impacts on the environment include impacts on biophysical environments, biodiversity and other resources. The term anthropogenic designates an effect or object resulting from human activity.

The term is sometimes used in the context of pollution emissions that are produced as a result of human activities but applies broadly to all major human impacts on the environment. These human activities have brought a lot of impacts on our environment.

These impacts lead to global warming, climate change and depletion of ozone layer. The rainy patterns are changing and droughts in some places such as the southern part of Zambia because of these effects.

In this just-ended farming season we had a poor rainy pattern in places such as Sinazongwe which has brought a call to the Government to intervene by providing relief food. These are just some of the outcomes of impacts of human activities. Some of the causes of these impacts include:

Technology

The application of technology often results in unavoidable environmental impacts. For example, given that the purpose of many technologies is to exploit, control, or otherwise improve upon nature for the perceived benefit of mankind while at the same time the myriad of processes in nature have been optimised and are continually adjusted by evolution, there will be disturbance of these natural processes by technology.

This results in negative environmental consequences. Technology has reached an advanced stage in terms of manufacturing products.

These operations result in emissions of different gases which affect our environment.

Agriculture

The environmental impact of agriculture varies based on the wide variety of agricultural practices employed around the world. Agriculture causes water pollution in the rural streams due to run-off from farming activity.

Agriculture has been shown to produce significant effects on climate change, primarily through the production and release of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide but also by altering the earth’ land cover, which can change its ability to absorb or reflect heat and light, thus contributing to radiative forcing.

Land use change such as deforestation and desertification together with use of fossil fuels are the major anthropogenic sources of carbon dioxide. Agriculture itself is the major contributor to increasing methane and nitrous oxide concentrations in earth’s atmosphere.

The use of inorganic fertilisers and pesticides kills the diversity of arthropods which helps in maintaining our ecosystem healthy.

The environmental impact of pesticides is often greater than what is intended by those who use them.

Mire than 98 per cent of sprayed insecticides and 95 per cent of herbicides reach a destination other than their target species, including no target species, air, water bottom sediments and food.

Pesticides contaminates land and water when it escapes from production sites and storage tanks, when it runs off from fields, when it is discarded, sprayed aerially, and when it is sprayed into water to kill algae.

The amount of pesticides that migrates from the intended application area is influenced by the particular chemical properties: Its propensity for binding to soil, its vapour pressure, water solubility and its resistance to being broken down over time.

Factors in the soil such as its texture, ability to retain water and the amount of organic matter contained in it, also affect the amount of pesticides that will leave the area. Some pesticides contribute to global warming and the depletion of the ozone layer.

Fishing

The environmental impact of fishing can be divided into issues that involve the availability of fish to be caught such as overfishing, sustainable fisheries and fisheries management; and issues that involve the impact of fishing on other elements of the environment such as by-catch.

These conservation issues are part of marine conservation and are addressed in fisheries science programmes. There is a growing gap between how many fish are available to be caught and humanity’s desire to catch them, a problem that gets worse as the world population grows.

Similar to other environmental issues, there can be conflict between the fishermen who depend on fishing for their livelihoods and fisheries departments that realise that if future fish populations are to be sustainable then some fisheries must reduce or even close.

Mining

The environmental impact of mining includes erosion, formation of sinkholes, and loss of biodiversity and contamination of soil, groundwater and surface water by chemicals from mining processes.

In some cases, additional forest logging is done in the vicinity of mines to increase the available room for the storage of the created debris and soil.

Besides creating environmental damage, the contamination resulting from leakage of chemicals also affects the health of the local population.

Mining companies in some countries are required to follow environmental and rehabilitation codes, ensuring the area mined is returned close to its original state.

We saw a lot of mining companies such as Mopani embarking on reforestation during this year’s World Environmental Week. Some mining methods may have significant environmental and public health effects.

Some environmental impact of the coal industry includes the consideration of issues such as land use, waste management, water and air pollution caused by coal mining, processing and the use of its product.

In addition to atmospheric pollution, coal burning produces hundreds of millions of tonnes of solid waste products annually, including fly ash, bottom ash and flue-gas desulfurisation sludge that contain mercury, uranium, thorium, arsenic and other heavy metals.

There are severe health effects caused by burning coal. According to the reports issued by the World Health Organisation in 2008 and by environmental groups in 2004, coal particulates pollution is estimated to shorten approximately 1,000,000 lives annually worldwide.

Activities such as open pit mining require large amounts of water for coal or any other minerals preparation plants and dust suppression.

To meet this requirement mines acquire surface or groundwater supplies from nearby agriculture or domestic users, which reduces the productivity of these operations or halts them.

These water resources (once separated from their original environment) are rarely returned after mining, creating permanent degradation in agricultural productivity.

These mining activities require a large area of land, methods such as strip mining severely alters the landscape, which reduces the value of the natural environment in the surrounding land.

If mining is allowed, resident human populations must be resettled of the mine site and eliminate existing vegetation, destroying the soil profile, displacing or destroying wildlife and habitat.

Paper

The environmental impact of paper is significant, which has led to changes in industry and behaviour at both business and personal levels. With the use of modern technology such as the printing press and the highly mechanised harvesting of wood, paper has become a cheap commodity.

This has led to a high level of consumption and waste. With the rise in environmental organisations and with increased Government regulation, there is now a trend towards sustainability in the pulp and paper industry.

Topsoil loss

Industrialisation of agriculture during the last 150 years, specifically the widespread use of fossil fuel powered farm machinery for plowing, has resulted in massive topsoil loss.

Soils are currently lost at the rate of inches per decade while it takes hundreds of years for one inch of new topsoil to form. Worldwide about one-third of arable land has been lost due to erosion.

Transport

Technology is growing at a high rate, and this has seen the coming of new versions of cars at affordable prices.

Also due to the competition of car production companies, prices are normally brought down to attract more customers.

Increase in the number of cars has impacted significantly because cars are major users of energy, and burn most of the world’s petroleum.

This creates air pollution, including nitrous oxides and particulates and is a significant contributor to global warming through emission of carbon dioxide, for which transport is the fastest-growing emission sector.

Measures should be taken to at least reduce these causes. This is not a call on the Government but every individual on this planet.

Interested individuals, stakeholders, NGOs and society at large should work together in trying to find ways of reducing these problems arising from human activities but the Government, as the mother body, should spearhead these policies.

Cars emit a lot carbon dioxide which contributes much to global warming, this can be at least reduced by diverting from road transport to railway.

The current Government has pumped resources in the Zambia railway line trying to revamp the services offered by Zambia Railways, and trying to reduce carbon emissions from road transport and congestions.

Mining companies should embark on reforestation programmes, being major causes of deforestation and air pollution.

Also practising sustainable agriculture, the Ministry of Agriculture under the research department has been working and sensitising the public on the benefits of sustainable agriculture.

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