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Page added on September 29, 2012
Human Population Growth Impacts
Unchecked human population growth could be a recipe for doom for the planet and its inhabitants. And it has reached staggering levels in recent years—the number of people on the planet has doubled from 3.5 billion to seven billion in just a half century. While we’ve made great strides in educating people around the world about family planning and birth control, the global fertility rate still hovers around 2.5 children per woman. At that rate, population will grow to 11 billion by 2050 and nearly 27 billion by 2100.
While such a scenario is unlikely given that fertility rates tend to decline as countries develop and modernize, the prospect of a planet with tens of billions of people on it is scary indeed. The first widely published pundit on the potential impacts of too much human population growth was Englishman Thomas Malthus, whose 1798 “An Essay on the Principle of Human Population” warned that violence, genocide, nasty weather, disease epidemics and pestilence would be precursors to widespread famine in a world with too many humans. “The power of population is so superior to the power of the earth to produce subsistence for man, that premature death must in some shape or other visit the human race,” he wrote.
History views Malthus as an extremist and many would argue that, despite population having swelled some seven times since his day, we have so far managed to avert a planet-wide “Malthusian catastrophe” whereby population has simply outpaced our ability to feed ourselves. Nonetheless, a 2007 UNICEF report indicated that 10.9 children under five-years-old die each year around the world, with malnutrition and other hunger-related diseases responsible for 60 percent of the tragedy. And a 2009 World Health Organization and UNICEF study found that some 24,000 children in developing countries were dying each day from preventable causes like diarrhea resulting from lack of access to clean water for drinking and sanitation.
The most obvious issue with seven billion of us here is our profligate consumption of dwindling natural resources and the waste and pollution generated in the process. A recent joint study by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and the Worldwatch Institute found that humans now use 20 percent more renewable resources than can be replaced each year. And while many would say that climate change has eclipsed overpopulation as the major issue of the day, others counter that atmospheric temperatures wouldn’t be growing nearly as much if there weren’t so darn many of us burning so many fossil fuels.
Human population numbers are predicted to trend downward around the world within a few generations. This so-called “demographic transition” is already underway in the U.S. and other developed countries where fertility rates have dropped due to lower infant mortality, increased urbanization and wider access to contraceptives. Given that fertility rates drop as countries develop, and that lesser developed countries have begun to leapfrog ahead in their urbanization and adoption of technology, the United Nations Population Fund predicts that population may peak in the late 21st century and then begin to shrink.
6 Comments on "Human Population Growth Impacts"
BillT on Sun, 30th Sep 2012 12:10 am
Why so many population articles here? We all know that there are too many of us. We also know that human nature is not going to change quick enough to make a difference. We are headed to a major die-off of billions over the next few decades. Painful, but necessary.
(Waiting for Kenz300’s canned reply…lol)
Kenz300 on Sun, 30th Sep 2012 12:14 am
Quote — “Unchecked human population growth could be a recipe for doom for the planet and its inhabitants. And it has reached staggering levels in recent years—the number of people on the planet has doubled from 3.5 billion to seven billion in just a half century.”
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Every problem from the food crisis, water crisis, fish stocks crisis, financial crisis, climate change crisis and jobs crisis are all harder to solve with the endless population growth.
Accessto family planning services needs to be available to all that want it.
Every country needs to develop a plan to balance its population with its resources, food, water, energy and jobs.
Whoknows on Sun, 30th Sep 2012 1:00 am
Population growth overall is decline and I think any decline will be occurring in the developed first. That highly unfit ( obese as well) and aging population are probably going to see declines.
On the other hand, poor nations are seeing high fertility rate because of mortality rates. As we’ve seen in the history, regardless of contraception strategy, fertility rate lags mortality rate. Chile’s total fertility rate is below that of US (also below replacement) despite abortion being illegal and below average contraception access.
This intimate relationship between mortality and fertility is noted in biology. Get rid of the destructive IMF structural adjustment policies, colonial-style controls of these nations resources, and you’ll see population growth decline. Sure we’ll face increased competition ( further demand destruction), but at least allow the still-colonized third world states to significantly raise taxation to fund infrastructure and economic development.
We could easily see Finland or Singaporean style economic growth in the third world. In fact, those with immense resources will probably see much more aggressive growth. These nations could diversify quicker by outright acquiring intellectual property and co-production arrangements ala Japan. As I said, their growth will be eating into our ability to exit the recession.
Otherwise, expect population growth to continue skyrocketing. People will perish, but eventually those third world resource powers (including Saudi Arabia, Angola, etc) will collapse. When that happens, the West’s resource availability situation will be extremely poor. We’ll be in trouble, especially the aged and obese. The latter is totally preventable, but is taking precious resources that should be going into mitigating peak oil.
And expect massive migrations that will illegal immigration from Mexico look irrelevant. Instead you’ll see highly desperate refugees (vs. economic migrants) and with the energy/ water scarcity situation, Southern Europeans will be included. China and India will probably start ethnic-cleansing/ colonial migration schemes much like the Europeans in the past. We’re already seeing Indian authoritie allow the displacement of the native, Indian-born, “yellow” Sino-Tibetan peoples in the North-East even if it is largely led by non-Indian, but brown-skinned, Bangladeshis. China, interestingly, has even less arable land than India!
VivKay on Sun, 30th Sep 2012 2:51 am
Extinction is a natural process. Humans obviously are instinctively manufacturing their own demise. The tide of our population explosion won’t be turned fast enough and will outpace energy, food and water supplies and exacerbate the problems our shrinking planet is already experiencing. Our die-off is inevitable. The top of the food chain is the most vulnerable place to be.
Kenz300 on Sun, 30th Sep 2012 1:57 pm
Population growth is the elephant in the room. We all realize it is a problem and will only lead to more poverty, suffering and despair but we would rather not discuss it.
We talk about food scarcity, Oil scarcity,Water scarcity, Collapsing fish stocks from over fishing, Climate Change….. and on and on…..
Every problem is made worse with the daily growth of the human population. We added over 80 million more mouths to feed in the past year. Endless population growth is not sustainable and competes with finite resources. We need to talk more about its impacts on the world around us. Endless population growth makes every other problem harder to solve.
Arthur on Mon, 1st Oct 2012 8:56 am
“That highly unfit ( obese as well) and aging population are probably going to see declines.”
You have yet to understand how totally dependent you are on these “highly unfit and aging people” for your food, your energy, your everything. If whitey pulls of his hands from you, you are finished. Or maybe China will give you a hand. Remember though that they think purely ethnically and are in no way ‘handicaped’ by any christian consideration of love-theigh-neighbour sentimentality.