Activism Change

Population facts and myths (Pt 2)

Question:

[snip] The cause of the destruction of environment is sin.

[snip] One of the biggest causes of the destruction of the environment is population growth.  So is this a sin? student

Response:

: Fact sheet 6 – Population and the environment : The case for population control is increasingly based upon the assumption that : population growth is bad for the environment. To Western lobbyists it seems : almost : self evident that more people make for a more polluted and degraded : environment. But this is self-evident to anyone with brains, Pat. : However, many of the dramatic claims of desertification, deforestation and soil : : degradation are not supported by research, and have more to do with pressure : group :  politics than science. What a bunch of lies.

Can’t handler the truth can you ole salt?  Pax Christi, Pat Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam (To the Greater Glory of God)

Response:

One of the biggest causes of the destruction of the environment is population growth.  So is this a sin?

No, because you havn’t proven there is a problem with population growth.  And if there were, does that mean we can do an evil to fix an evil? Nope!  Pax Christi, Pat Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam (To the Greater Glory of God)

Response:

        … : This is deceptive propaganda. The relationship is clear and direct, as is : obvious to anyone who is honest. The massive and truly tragic destruction : of Nature in our time is directly attributable to the massive global : population increase in the 20th century. : : The cause of the destruction of environment is sin. No, the destruction of the environment is sin. And one of the causes of this sin is the blindness of those who refuse to see the direct link between population growth and environmental destruction. Fortunately, outside of the crazy bunker that is the Vatican, such nonsense is usually laughed at… Blessings, Yuri. Yuri Kuchinsky in Toronto -=O=- http://www.io.org/~yuku It is a far, far better thing to have a firm anchor in nonsense than to put out on the troubled seas of thought -=O=- John K. Galbraith

Response:

: Fact sheet 6 – Population and the environment : The case for population control is increasingly based upon the assumption that : population growth is bad for the environment. To Western lobbyists it seems : almost : self evident that more people make for a more polluted and degraded : environment. But this is self-evident to anyone with brains, Pat. : However, many of the dramatic claims of desertification, deforestation and soil : : degradation are not supported by research, and have more to do with pressure : group :  politics than science. What a bunch of lies. :  Academics working in the field have increasingly come to recognise that the : relationship, if any, between population and the environment is a complicated : one, in : which many factors interact. This view was expressed by University of Michigan : demographer Gay Ness in her article Population and the Environment Framework : for : Analysis (1994): :  "There is no simple and direct relationship between population and the : environment. : Identifiable forms of technology and social organisation mediate impacts in : both : directions. It is only through these that either population or the environment : affect one : another." This is deceptive propaganda. The relationship is clear and direct, as is obvious to anyone who is honest. The massive and truly tragic destruction of Nature in our time is directly attributable to the massive global population increase in the 20th century. Hundreds more lines of Pat’s canned tripe snipped. Stop the lies, Pat. In defence of people and nature, Yuri. Yuri Kuchinsky in Toronto -=O=- http://www.io.org/~yuku For every credibility gap, there is a gullibility fill -=O=- R. Clopton

Response:

Fact sheet 6 – Population and the environment The case for population control is increasingly based upon the assumption that population growth is bad for the environment. To Western lobbyists it seems almost self evident that more people make for a more polluted and degraded environment. However, many of the dramatic claims of desertification, deforestation and soil degradation are not supported by research, and have more to do with pressure group politics than science.  Academics working in the field have increasingly come to recognise that the relationship, if any, between population and the environment is a complicated one, in which many factors interact. This view was expressed by University of Michigan demographer Gay Ness in her article Population and the Environment Framework for Analysis (1994):  "There is no simple and direct relationship between population and the environment. Identifiable forms of technology and social organisation mediate impacts in both directions. It is only through these that either population or the environment affect one another." In other words, population growth and environmental deterioration may occur at the same time; they may be connected, or the environmental problems could be caused by some other factor. On the other hand, population growth can sometimes accompany improvements in the environment, and may even be the cause of them. Example 1 In the Kano close-settled zone of Northern Nigeria soil surveys taken 20 years apart showed no significant signs soil degradation, in spite of the fact that population had grown and crop yields had increased substantially over the period. The explanation was that the population of sheep and goats increased with the humans. These were tethered during the growing season, then their dung was put out as manure specifically placed for each cereal plant. Also, by careful examination of aerial photographs over 30 years it is evident that tree densities have increased – largely to feed the growing numbers of small livestock. Example 2  In the semi-arid Machakos district of Kenya there was great concern over irreparable environmental degradation" in the 1930s and 1 940s, largely as the result of the loss of topsoil following heavy rains after droughts. In their book More People, Less Erosion (1993), which surveys the area from 1930 to the present day, Michael Mortimore and Mary Tiffen compared photographs of the same landscapes taken 50 or 60 years apart which showed dramatic improvements. Cultivated fields and increased tree cover had replaced scarred landscapes of scrub cut through by gullies. This was in spite of the fact that the population had increased by five times, and agricultural output by ten times per hectare and by three times per head. The explanation lay in the construction of terraces on the hillsides to retain moisture, which also had the effect of stopping soil erosion. This involved labour intensive technology, which only became possible with population growth, coupled with access to a good market outlet for food surpluses. A nationwide survey of Kenyan smallholder farmers indicated that this is no local anomaly, for the same kinds of positive change were to be found in all areas of high population density. Example 3  Desertification is the name given to the supposed process by which deserts are spreading as the result of intensive and inappropriate farming methods caused by population growth. However careful, long term studies like Michael Mortimore’s Adapting to Drought (Cambridge University Press, 1989) suggest that both the landscapes and the people are tougher and more adaptable than this model would suggest. In the zones d’attent around the Mali inland delta drought and political problems concentrated livestock in one area, causing extensive deforestation and sheet erosion. Herders responded by increasing the ratio of sheep/goats to cattle. Goats browsed the acacia pods and scarified the seeds during digestion. When the rains improved in the early 1990s, much of the zones d’attent became re-afforested with acacia. Example 4  In the densely populated Ethiopian Highlands per capita fuel consumption is up to ten times less than in the rest of sub-Saharan Africa- a fact which was unrecognised in a major study determining Ethiopia’s past fuelwood policy. Those who have stopped to look, rather than just making assumptions, have noted a cooking technology in which the fermentation of the staple t’ef cereal lessens the time required for cooking the wide injera pancakes. Similar observations hold true when other cultures with high population densities are examined: both India and China have developed or taken up similar efficient fuel-saving techniques. Example 5  The idea that countries and districts have a certain "carrying capacity" of population has been used as the basis for claims that tropical grasslands have become over- cultivated and over-populated. However, the concept of a fixed "carrying capacity" is inappropriate. "Over-grazed" waterholes receive higher dung inputs and so produce more grass. "Over-cultivated" areas precipitate the crises  which lead to intensification and more efficient resource recycling, which in turn increases the "carrying capacity" of the land – sometimes by as much as ten times. Where cattle and human population densities have increased there has been a move towards agro-pastoralism (i.e. mixed farming involving crops and animals) and a decrease in sleeping sickness due to the falling numbers of tsetse fly which result. (see David Bourne and Stephen Wint, Nigerian Livestock Resources, 1993). Example 6  Rates of deforestation which threaten the very existence of rainforests have been blamed on population growth and increased human use of forest resources. However many of these estimates of forest clearance have been exaggerated through failure to include the rates at which forests regenerate themselves. There has been particular concern about the loss of "pristine" Amazonian rainforest, which is supposed to have been never previously disturbed by man. In fact much of this "pristine" rainforest was cleared for maize cultivation prior to the 16th century. Paradoxically, these areas which were farmed before returning to forest cover often have greater bio-diversity (i.e. more species) than the primary forests. Caution required  A paper presented to a preparatory meeting of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) by the Overseas Development Administration in 1991 warned that, as the links between population and the environment are so complex, "any policy conclusions have therefore to reflect this lack of a firm empirical foundation". In other words, we need to tread carefully if we are hoping to persuade people to have fewer children for the sake of the environment. They may be living at a time and place at which larger families would actually help. Fact sheet 7 – Population and Feminism In 1974 the National Security Council of the United States presented to the President a study on The Implications of Worldwide Population Growth for US Security and Overseas Interests. It warned that population growth in the third world might present "political or even national security problems for the US", but that efforts by the US to control it might be seen as imperialism. It therefore recommended that all such efforts be couched in terms of "the right of the individual to determine freely and responsibly the number and spacing of children.. .and the fundamental social and economic development of poor countries."  The linking of population control with demands for reproductive rights was crucial to the progress of the movement. It enabled population controllers to "tap in" to the growing feminist movement, with its demands for freedom of choice in matters of childbearing. The population controllers effectively high-jacked the language and agenda of the feminist movement. Regrettably, many Western feminists were willing to lend it support, on the basis that it made contraception and abortion available to third world women. They did not reflect that the use of these technologies might not be voluntary. Nor did they question the assumption, so common amongst Western lobby groups, that the interests of white, Western, middle class activists might not be the same as those of poor, third world people. The backlash  We have seen in recent years the emergence of a major feminist backlash against population control, with the formation of groups like Health Action International in Amsterdam and FlNNRAGE (Feminist International Network for Resistance Against Reproductive Technologies and Genetic Engineering).  Women involved with these groups have insisted that women’s interests are not served by population programmes which put the achievement of demographic targets above women’s health needs. According to the HAI publication <A Question of Control (1992):  "There are many problems in the way contraceptives are provided in third world countries. Many women only have access to services which try to limit population growth. This affects the kind of choice they are given and the type of health care they receive… Governments that aim to reduce population growth by imposing targets for the number of acceptors of contraception and by introducing incentives and disincentives to encourage use often fail to fully acknowledge women’s reproductive rights."  In publications like <Norplant: Under Her Skin (1993: Women’s Health Action Foundation) and <Vaccination against Pregnancy (1993: Health Action International) feminist writers from around the world give examples of the ways in which women’s rights are violated by population programmes, when they are pressured to have fewer children to meet government … read more »

Response:

Filed under: Feminism

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