Today, we suffer from a “population explosion.” This means that the world’s population has been booming rapidly, rising to unwanted numbers. Looking back at history, the world’s population in 3,000 BC was an estimated 200 million, but now the world’s population has gone up to 7 billion. As we arrive at an environmental tipping position, we have to find solutions for this speedy growth. Overpopulation can contain a numeral of effects, the majority of which are negative as examined below.
- Lack of Water
- Lower Life Expectancy
- Extinction
- Resource Consumption
- Increased Intensive Farming
- Faster Climate Change
Lack of Water:
Overpopulation creates superior demand for the world’s freshwater supplies. As only approximately 1% of the world’s water is clean and accessible, this creates a key issue. Some estimates state that humans require freshwater will stand at approximately 70% of what is obtainable on the planet by 2025. This will position those living in poor areas that already have partial access to such water in great danger.
Lower Life Expectancy:
While higher life expectancy is leading to increases in population in developed countries, lower life expectancy may be caused by the booms in a population that less developed nations are experiencing. A large proportion of the world’s population growth occurs in less developed countries. These stretch the resources these countries have thinner resultant in less right to use to medical care, fresh water, food and jobs, all consequential in a fall in life expectancy.
Extinction:
The outcome of overpopulation on the world’s natural world is moreover a major issue. As demand for land grows, so too does the destruction of natural habitats, such as forests. Some scientists caution that if their trends continue, as many as 50% of the world’s wildlife species will be at hazard of death. Data has also been collected to show that there is a direct link between increases in the human population and decreases in the number of species on the planet.
Resource Consumption:
As the population grows, so too does the number of resources required to keep so many people alive. Food, water, and fossil fuels are all organisms consumed at record rates, placing superior demands on producers and the planet itself. Ironically, it is the discovery of many of these natural resources – particularly fossil fuels – that have contributed to conditions that are favorable to population growth. A study has shown that the world’s ecosystem changed more rapidly in the latter half of the twentieth century than at any other point in history because of the increased use of these resources.
Increased Intensive Farming:
As the population has full-grown over the years, farming practice has evolved to produce sufficient food to feed larger numbers of people. Still, intensive farming methods also reason spoil to local ecosystems and the land, which may fake problems in the future. Furthermore, intensive farming is also considered a major contributor to climate change due to the machinery required. This effect will likely make stronger if the population continues to produce at its existing rate.
Faster Climate Change:
Overpopulation straight correlates to the type of weather change, mostly as larger nations, like China and India, keep on to develop their industrial capacities. They now rank as two of the three largest contributors to emissions in the world, alongside the United States. 97% of the scientific community agrees that human activities are changing global temperatures. Higher populations may rate these changes up, particularly if more is not complete to decrease individual carbon footprints on a large scale.
So now we know more about overpopulation and the effects it can have, but what can be done about it? There are a number of proposed solutions.
- Better sex education
- Access to Contraceptives
- Changes in Policy
- Education on the Subject
Better sex education:
A lack of sex education – or poorly-implemented education – has led to overpopulation issues in many countries. The issue is so pronounced that the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) is calling for improvements to be made, particularly in poorer areas of the world.
Better education https://heatfeed.com/education/ will help people understand more about the potential consequences of having sex as they relate to childbirth. It will moreover do away with a lot of the myths that surround the sexual do something and bring in scientifically-proven methods of birth control.
Access to Contraceptives:
Access to birth control must go hand-in-hand with better sex education. After all, lacking it people cannot set what they have educated into put into practice. The World Health Organization (WHO) states that 225 million women who are living in developing countries would prefer to postpone giving birth but are not using any form of contraception. Many organizations, such as the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), also support improving access to contraceptives.
Changes in Policy:
Many nations offer rewards, whether in the form of financial incentives or increased benefits, to those who have more children. This may lead to some couples having more children than they otherwise would if they needed to worry about the financial consequences. This is a difficult issue to confront.
Education on the Subject:
While a number of organizations exist to provide schools with curricula and teaching materials to cover the subject of overpopulation, it is still a subject that is not covered in schools as well as it should be. This education is supposed to expand beyond a discussion about sex and into the global consequences of overpopulation. Dialog about the subject needs to be more open, with sites like debate.org offering useful resources that allow the issue to be confronted rationally.
Overpopulation is a disaster that potentially stands besides climate change as one of the major challenges facing humanity nowadays. Regardless of this, there is little in the means of education or dialog relating to the issue, mostly in schools. If this doesn’t change, the issues highlighted in this article may carry on to rise unabated. If that happens, this one matter could have a knock-on effect that will show the way to untold harms in the future. If you wish to share your own opinions about overpopulation, please do continue the debate in the comments section below. Alternatively, share this article on social media to encourage a conversation in your own community.
