It is not in doubt that currently, nations the world over are faced with an environmental crisis that at best, may be thought of as being self-inflicted. Fossils fuels are getting depleted at an alarming rate according to Karam (2008), with the consumption rate believed to have increased two folds from 1900 moving forward. Global warming, thanks to carbon dioxide emissions, is threatening to tear apart the arctic region, thereby endangering the lives of polar bears.
A global food crisis looms large, and especially in the developing countries of Asia and Africa. A 2001 report published by Worldwatch Institute also offered a suggestion that such environmental problems as reduced access to sufficient resources to cater for a burgeoning population pose a great danger to the global economy. With such alarming statistics glaring their eyes on us, what then, could be the root cause of the current crisis to the environment?
With scientists pointing at over-consumption of natural resources, coupled with overpopulation amongst nations, still, there is a school of thought who holds the idea that modern capitalism happens to be the root cause of the current crisis in our environment. Of course, when we assume such a perspective, modern capitalism integrates accumulation, limitless growth as well as consumption. The rise in capitalism, coupled with a spreading of the same has witnessed a rapid population increase and a rapid rise in technological advances meant to harness the natural resources.
The current technological levels have also been blamed for the prevailing crisis within the environment. Nevertheless, the very answers to the prevailing environmental crisis could still be found in a proper harnessing of the current technological advances. As Daniel Chiras has noted in his 2006 publication ‘Environmental science’, proper technology is more of a solution to the current environmental crisis, as opposed to root causes.
The consumption levels that are being witnessed today in the various countries of the world appear to challenge the resource base of our environment, thereby intensifying disparities. With a crisis looming large in our environment, there is an air of uncertainty that seems to hang upon our future (Speth, 2008). This ought to be enough challenge for us to embrace such consumption habits as shall enable us to uphold sustainability of natural resources. The global growth in human consumption may be seen as a collective outcome of the year-by-year per capita increase in the rate of consumption as well as the global rise in population.
The rate at which the global population is growing is extremely shocking and not even efficiency, incremental conservation measures, or fixes through technology may offer us any respite here. Overpopulation plays a principal role with regard to causing changes in the climate and by extension, global warming, and thus it is a root cause of the current crisis to the environment. A rise in population translates into energy and food crises.
In slightly over a century, the population of the world has increased seven-folds, from a billion, to now stand at seven billion. A 2006 projection by the United Nations indicates that by 2030, the world population shall have hit the 10 billion mark. The situation is made worse by the fact that the available resources (notably the fossil fuels) have not increased in tandem with this growth in population and is, therefore, reason enough of us to be wary of an impending loss of the ecosystem, scarce water, and ocean dead zone.
References
Karam, G. (2008). “Roots of the environmental crisis”. Web.
Speth, J. G. (2008). “The bridge at the edge of the world: capitalism, the environment, and crossing from crisis to sustainability”. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Web.