Technocracy ->
Periodicals ->
Social Trends Newsletter ->
May 95, #135 ->
Trendevents: Racing to Extinction
|
Technocracy ->
Periodicals ->
Social Trends Newsletter ->
May 95, #135 ->
Trendevents: Racing to Extinction
|
Search |
Published in:
Each year, about 90 million new people swell the human population, now at 5.6 billion.
Massive food shortages will develop over the next 40 years as world population increases to 8.9 billion by 2030. It could reach 10 billion if the present rate of population growth continues.
Nearly 2 billion people worldwide lack adequate and potable water, likely to increase to 3.6 billion by 2000.
Poverty compels the world's 1.2 billion bottom-most poor to misuse their environment and ravage what resources they have. This in contrast with the richest 1.3 billion who exploit and consume a disproportionate amount of resources.
Whereas an average Bangladeshi consumes the equivalent of 3 barrels of oil yearly, each American consumes an average of 55 barrels of oil each year.
It is estimated that for every billion people that is added to this one and only finite planet earth, it will require 250 million more acres of agriculture land. There are no more bountiful frontiers; they are long gone. As the stress on the habitat and the remaining natural resources increases, it will create untold fragmentation.
Just to feed the whole world by the methods of the United States would require 80 percent of the world's total energy expenditure. Western-style agriculture, for all its spectacle, does not provide a suitable model for the rest of the world to follow.
Ten million children died from nutritional-related diseases in 1993. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reports that more than half (62 out of 115) of all developing nations will be unable to feed their projected population by 2000.
Land loss and degradation is an acute problem worldwide. Every year an estimated 1.2 billion hectares, an area the size of China and India combined, have lost much of their agricultural productivity since 1945.
Seventy-five nations have been experiencing a decline in food production per capita during the 1980s.
America has already lost over half of its top soil, and, according to the American Farmland Trust, continues to lose 2 million acreas of its farmland to development every year. Moreover, the U.S. loses an additional 3 billion tons of prime and irreplaceable top soil each year through wind and water erosion. Alternating between years of drought and floods, and with the incessant soil erosion, America's farms are faced with an uncertain future.
The quest for more crop and grazing land has sealed the fate of much of the world's tropical forests.
Between 1971 and 1986, forests shrank by at least 125 million hectares. If the current trend continues, most tropical forests will soon be destroyed or damaged beyond recovery.
When both agricultural and nonagricultural needs are taken into account, human populaton growth may be responsible for as much as 80 percent of the loss of forest cover worldwide.
Half of the world depends for heating and cooking on fuelwood. Since 1990, 100 million Third World residents have lacked sufficient fuelwood to meet their daily energy requirements.
The other half of the world's wood is cut as timber and milled and processed into boards, plywood, veneer, chipboard, paper, paperboard, and other products, mostly in industrial countries.
In 1991, the world economy consumed 3.4 billion cubic meters of wood. That amount is 2.5 times as much wood as was used in 1950--one third more per person.
At one time trees covered 26 percent of the land, but just 12 percent of the earth's surface (one- third of the initial total) consists of intact forest ecosystems now.
In nature's economy, forests play pivotal roles. They provide habitat for perhaps half of the 10 to 80 million forms of life on Earth. Forests hold much of the genetic information accumulated during 4 billion years of evolution. They buffer the global climate against greenhouse warming and moderate local climes. They prevent floods and droughts, help keep pests in check, filter the air, secure the soil and keep it out of the waterways, and nurture fisheries in rivers and lakes.
The original forests of the United States covered about 43 percent of the country, 48 percent of the open woodland of the Southwest included. By 1880, about 24 percent of the original eastern forest had been cleared for farms.
By 1850, the country's "mainfest destiny" had been filled by expansion to the Pacific Ocean. It was during this expansion that forests were cleared away to provide farm lands, huge logs of birch, beech, oak, walnut, maple, hickory, pine and hemlock were piled up and burned. Many trees were unnecessarily bled to death in order to produce naval stores. Vast acreages of forest were cleared that were in no way suited to agriculture.
The last major forest regions of the United States (and many parts of the world) have been drawn upon, and the limited extent of this most important resource has become reasonably clear. The end of virgin supplies is in sight.
Because of technological application and new methods, along with the rapid depletion of resources, those resource dependent towns and areas of the world's forest zones, demonstrate that the future for these communities no longer lies in extracting large quantities of timber, minerals and other raw materials. In the United States, for example, logging one million board feet of timber yields only 3 jobs. It is interesting to note that Japan will buy logs from the U. S. without putting a tariff on them, but any finished wood products coming from the U.S. to Japan have a heavy duty on them. It is etimated that the crafting of one million board feet of lumber will create 80 jobs.
Human and industrial activities may be responsible for as much as 35 million metric tons of nitrogen and up to 3.75 million tons of phosphorous flowing into the coastal waters, causing massive algal blooms and the depletion of oxygen levels, harming all marine life near the shores.
At the present rate of degradation, it is estimated that 70 percent of the world's reefs will be gone or beyond recognition in 20 to 40 years. Only 30 percent, now located away from development, are in stable condition.
All of the 17 major fishing areas in the world have reached or exceeded natural limits. Coastal fisheries have been overexploited, are in serious decline or have collapsed.
Marine photosynthesis is at the foundation of the oceanic systems that yield 80 million tons of seafood per year. Globally, the marine catch accounts for 16 percent of animal-protein consumption, and is an important source of protein in developing countries. In Asia, one billion people rely on fish as a food supply, as do many people in island and coastal nations of Africa. By not treating the oceans and seas of the world in a wholesome manner and recognizing how necessary they are to the ecosystem, our survival as a species could be jeopardized.
Through the energy provided by the sun, water evaporates from the oceans and the land, is carried as vapor in the air, falls somewhere as rain or snow, and returns to the oceans or to the land again to go through the same process.
Only about 0.01 percent of the world's total water is easily available for human use. The world is divided into water "haves" and "have nots."
As the world's human population increases, the amount of water available per person decreases. The amount of water available per person has shrunk from more than 33,000 cubic meters (1.2 million cu.ft.) per year in 1850 to only 8,500 cubic meters (300,000 cu.ft.) today. It is estimated that because of population growth alone, by the year 2000 water demand in more than half the world's countries is likely to be twice what it was as recently as 1971. Already some 2 billion people in 80 countries must live with water constraints. (Japan recently had to ship water from Alaska.)
By 2025 some 48 nations will suffer water shortages. According to Qu Geping, China's Environmental Minister, the country can supply water sustainably to only 650 million people, not the current population of 1.2 billion. As are many nations throughout the world, China is drawing down its groundwater supplies and overusing surface waters beyond replenishment.
The United States withdraws an estimated 339 billion gallons of fresh water a day from lakes, rivers, streams and underground sources. America remains among the biggest water users.
Hidden from view, groundwater is the source for half of U.S. drinking water; in rural areas, about 96 percent. Roughly 65 percent of the groundwater withdrawn in the U.S. is used for irrigation. Overpumping has caused groundwater levels to drop in some critical areas to the point that is beyond replenishment. A most critical problem continues to be the control of the ever increasing quantities of harmful pollutant runoff from farms, cities, industry, construction sites and mines that contaminate the underground aquifers and other water sources.
A report by the National Resources Defense Council points out that during 1992 and 1993 nearly one in five Americans drank water from systems that either violated health standards or failed to test drinking water and report the tests as required by federal law.
According to NRDC and a number of environmental organizations, the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives weakened the Safe Drinking Water Act at a time when stricter regulations are needed. The seriousness of the problem, such as harmful bacteria, cancer-causing chemicals, lead and other dangerous contaminants in the water, didn't concern Congress even when epidemics broke out in the cities and other areas of the country.
Human society runs on energy, principally fossil fuels, such as oil, gas and coal. These three sources account for 90 percent of the global commercial energy production. Nuclear power, hydro-electricity and other sources provide the rest.
The industrial nations, with less than 25 percent of the world's population, burn or consume 70 percent of all fossil fuels. The United States, with about 6 percent of the world's population, consumes approximately 25 percent of the world's energy. Each American (per capita) uses the energy equivalent of 55 barrels of oil yearly.
The combustion from oil emitted 2.4 billion tons of carbon in 1993. Much of the oil is burned by motor vehicles, a most inefficient means of transportation.
The world's addiction to fossil fuels, especially among the industrial nations, has resulted in chronic, sometimes catastrophic, and harmful pollution of the air, water and land, and in most cases beyond what the ecosystems, the environment and man-made structures can tolerate. The hazardous mix of pollutants -- everything from sulfur dioxide and reactive hydrocarbons to heavy metals -- has a deleterious effect on the health of the people and the nations of the world.
In this industrial and technological age, oil is the most important and profitable commodity in the world. The value of the oil trade is greater than all other raw materials combined. It is estimated that half of the tonnage on the oceans and high seas consist of petroleum. While about 15 billion barrels are discovered per year, the world consumes approximately 20 billion barrels a year. The U.S. expenditures for energy comes to about $450 billion a year; over half of that amount is for petroleum products. The trucks and automobiles in the United States burn around 7.5 million gallons of gasoline and 8.5 million gallons of motor fuel a day.
In spite of the nationalization of their oil fields by the producing nations, once under the control of the Seven Sisters, the major world oil companies, even with OPEC, are still the main players in the petroleum business. They have branched out where they now own or control most of the gas, coal and uranium deposits. The major oil companies have sales (GNP) and assets bigger than many countries throughout the world -- an industry that dwarfs the biggest megacorporations.
The American people should not expect that a comprehensive conservation energy program will ever be implemented under the present economic system, or any drastic reduction in pollution and hazardous waste by-products, nor the return soon of what is left of America's heritage to the nation and the people. The sop that comes by way of an understaffed, underfunded and Congressional controlled EPA is just about all the nation and the American people can expect from a financial-structured economy, an economy where politicians are concerned only with their personal aggrandizement and the perpetuation of the system that makes it possible.
For what reason or purpose, and what would be the consequences by continuing the development and increasing the energy production and consumption at a higher level than has already been obtained in the industrial and technological societies? Just to produce more obsolescence, waste and junk, and use more of the world's depleted resources to maintain this highly inefficient system.?
More than 430 commercial nuclear reactors operate in 28 countries, providing about 17 percent of the world's electricity. The 109 reactors in operation in the United States have created 22,000 tons of spent fuel, according to the Department of Energy. By the year 2000, the amount will increase to an estimated 40,000 tons. This stuff (spent nuclear waste) won't go away: not tomorrow, not in a century, not in 25,000 years. Spent nuclear fuel or waste is highly radioactive and dangerous to handle, insulate and store. As of yet, there is no safe way to dispose of this hazardous and highly volatile waste material.
The development of nuclear energy and the production of thousands of nuclear bombs and warheads may have deterred the Soviet Union (if that was the real purpose behind this policy), but in reality and in the final analysis this abomination created nothing more than an uncontrollable menace for the United States and the world for centuries to come.
Creating and capitalizing on calamity is an inherent characteristic of the financial and monetary system. There can be no doubt that this nuclear aberration will be used by the entrepreneurial and political opportunists and the various vested interests in any manner possible as long as there is a profit to be gained.
The ideological folly of the Cold War resulted in one of the largest parasitic waste of natural and essential resources in the history of the world and has from its financial cost brought about a situation where the United States has become the largest debtor nation in the world, and its economy has been kept afloat by the mere creation of mega amounts of debt. As for the former Soviet Union, it is in a state of economic disarray and fragmented.
Had the United States mobilized all of its natural and human resources following World War II for the reconstruction and redesigning of its social and technological structure for constructive instead of destructive pursuits, the country and the American people would have been enjoying economic stability and peace with the world for the past half century. But nobody listened or paid attention (the same today) to those few concerned and conscientious voices in the wilderness who let it be known that there is a meaningful and positive alternative to a policy that leads the nation to a dead end.
For a country that was once endowed with the greatest array of natural resources in the world, and the beneficiary of these resources that took eons for the forces of nature to create, the United States in its short history has used and wasted these resources as if they were unlimited. Manifest destiny, the movement across the land from the Atlantic to the Pacific ocean, with its wanton destruction and devastation of the country's resources in the process became the pattern for future development and discoveries.
Instead of the industrial and agricultural revolution benefiting humanity, and instead of the resources, discoveries and technology being developed and used in a meaningful and efficient manner to provide and sustain a decent and quality lifestyle, the United States and the other industrial nations have plundered and continue to plunder what is left of theirs and the world's natural resources. In the process they have misused the technology and the scientific innovations and discoveries to produce mere obsolescence, mountains of waste of all kinds, creating irreplaceable and irreversible damage to the environment and ecosystems, including the health of their nations and the world.
Adding to the burdens of the world is the ever increasing rate in the growth of population. The figures are staggering, amounting to the equivalent of over 90 new cities of a million people every year. At the present rate of growth, the population of the world of 5.6 billion today will increase to about 8.5 billion by 2025. The carrying capacity of this Earth is already beyond its limits of sustainability, and the way the remaining natural resources are being devoured, the task of dealing with this ongoing crisis does not present an easy solution, not when there are already tens of millions of people worldwide living in poverty, just holding on and suffering from chronic malnutrition and hunger. Compounding the magnitude of the problem is the estimated 49 million refugees who have been put to flight by wars, internal conflicts and famine.
What makes the situation more precarious, there are no new or bountiful frontiers left on this planet Earth. The search for new productive and sustainable agricultural areas is over. Any plans or thoughts to farm the Amazon basin must be treated with extreme caution. The top soil is very fragile and only a few inches deep, easily eroded and not conducive to farming or cattle raising. To continue to destroy the rain forest, or any forests without forethought, will have a serious impact and long-term effect on the land and all life forms throughout the world. The wanton destruction, the unnecessary uses of wood and the high rate of depletion of the forests over the years should put to rest the conviction that the timber supplies of the world are inexhaustible.
Commercial and military dominance, the superpower complex, acts as a shield for the financial and political interests against any consideration of the physical realities of this overexploited world; it totally disregards the Earth's resource limitations. Just to base world trade agreements on growth, investments and profitable considerations, and in the process using the Earth's resources indiscriminately by dumping a glut of goods and services on the world market compounds stupidity and makes any positive alternative remote. When a country like the United States produces more goods than it can distribute to its own citizens, it is time to look inward, not outward.
Unless the United States and the other nations of the world can disengage and make a complete transition from the financial and monetary system and implement a method of operation that is compatible with physical reality, then the decay and decline of modern civilization and our own demise becomes inevitable.