OVERPOPULATION

PROBLEMS

• Our world population has grown more since 1950 than it has in the previous four million years. With these additional people come additional demands on our earth: 80% of the original rain forests have been cleared or degraded; one-third to one halfof the Earth’s land surface has been transformed.
• We lose one or more entire species of animal or plant life every 20 minutes—some 27,000 species a year. This rate and scale of extinction has not occurred in 65 million years.
• Currently, 505 million people live in countries with water-stress or waterscarce conditions. By 2025, almost 48% of the Earth’s population–between 2.4and 3.4 billion people–will be living in areas of water stress or scarcity.
• Only 0.3% of the planet’s water is available for human use. Due to mismanagement, over 40% of the groundwater in the U.S. is contaminated by industrial, agricultural, and household pollution, making it extremely difficult and costly to purify.
• Americans are only 5% of the world’s population, yet we consume 25% of the world’s resources

PROBLEMS

• Six million acres of prime farmland—an area the size of Vermont—were lost in the United States alone between 1982 and 1992. Four of those six million acres were usurped by urban and suburban expansion. The other 2 million acres were lost through erosion caused by deforestation, unsustainable farming practices, and animal over-grazing.
• While the number of people living in 58 US metropolitan areas rose 80% between 1950 and 1990, the land covered by those areas expanded 305%.
• One U.S. citizen consumes about 30 times as much as a citizen of India. If everyone on earth lived like the average North American, it would require four more earths to provide all the material and energy.

HOW CONTROL IT

• Just replace yourself: have 2 children or fewer per couple
• Become a vegetarian (It takes 23 times more water to produce 1 ton of beef than it does to produce 1 ton of grain. One acre will feed cattle that will ultimately produce 123 pounds of beef, but that same acre could grow 30,000 pounds of potatoes).
• Buy less! Buy used! (the average American home for a family of four has doubled in size since 1950. Our cars are the biggest in the world, we replace our electronics every few years and our clothes every season, shopping has become a sport!)
• Government

Anthropogenic