Charles Mann, the author of the article “How Will We Feed the New Global Middle Class?” was giving a lot of public speaking about the future of our planet when it will be populated with 9 billion people by 2050. He concluded that there are only two sides in the dialogue regarding the issue – the followers of optimistic Norman Borlaug, who could be called Wizards, and the fans of more pessimistic William Vogt, the could be named Prophets. This paper aims to discuss the opinions of two sides in the dispute regarding the scarce planet resources and the rapid population growth.
To start with, economists admit there is no clear dependence between the level of population and the GDP / per person rate. There can be various scenarios, like increased workforce with the lack of workplaces, or economic growth, leading to increased taxes and GDP. However, the key factor that will determine the vector of development of each scenario is the well-thought-out policies implemented by states, not the demographic growth rates.
Wizards from Mann’s article are techno-optimists since they believe in the sustainable prosperity ensured by progress based on scientific research and discoveries. Norman Borlaug won his followers after he invented the dwarf grain that sustained the increased fertilization and brought up to 10 times more crops (Mann, 2018). The Rockefeller Fund later used this technique to hit the hunger in Asian nations. Conversely, William Vogt’s approach was once called “apocalyptic environmentalism” since its ideas stem from ecological knowledge and urge people to consume standing “lower in the food chain.” The point is that it takes dozen times more grain to grow to feed animals consumed as meat than to grow eatable vegetables and other crops. Besides, people who share Vogt’s position, the Prophets, warn the community of the dangers of increased production aimed to meet the increased demand for food since it can be ecologically ignorant.
Interestingly, David Rieff, the author of the Reproach of Hunger, is not a Prophet, but rather barely a pessimist. According to the reviewer Bailey, he says that there is no hope for a growing population. The author is sure that the global community will run out of resources and will not be able to feed the growing population. He also considers the new scientific methods to be over-romanticized and not have any practical application or substantial use to fight the problem.
At the same time, the reviewer Ronald Bailey sticks to the revisionist or neutralist position. He does not find any notions of how to fight the existing and potential hunger in Rieff’s book and says that liberal capitalism is the decision. Bailey implies that the recipe for prosperity should rest on the main pillars of democratic societies: strong property rights, a free press, the rule of law, free trade, honest bureaucracies, limited government, and democratic politics. The author of the article “Return of the Population Bomb,” William McGurn, is also neutralist since he mainly criticized the apocalyptical scenarios of the early and mid-20th century social scientists who were highly alarmed with the growing demographic rates in developing nations.
Thus, the Prophets think there is a need to reduce consumption and eat less meat and more plants. Therefore, they suggest that governments should implement policies that would limit production practices that damage the environment or are potentially harmful to planet resources such as soil and water. Then, Wizards think that populations from developing countries should by no means be restricted from consuming the same type of food that Westerners are used to. Noteworthy, some Wizards today say that scientific discoveries (maybe the ones like meat grown from cells in labs or soybean meat) can sustain the growing population and meet the increased demand. Therefore, they suggest that governments should invest in science and smart production to find the proper solution.
References
Mann, C. (2018). How will we feed the new global middle class? The Atlantic, 52-61.