Population Crisis?

The world is facing rapid growing populations. Since the industrial revolution, populations have swelled, but is rapid population growth a problem for the environment? Populations require food, energy, water, and other natural resources to sustain.  Nature can be seen as opposing a check on population sizes (Malthus, 1789), where populations can grow till they reach a carrying capacity of the environment. This is seen in nature with many living organisms, but this principle has not seemed to hold with people.  Surely people do negatively impact the environment, but the decline of the human race is always predicted, but populations keep growing.  Is it because we have not reached the carrying capacity of Earth? It is not that simple.  The human being is different then other living creatures on the planet in that it has the ability to modify the environment and adapt techniques to the situation they are in, not relying on instinct but on ingenuity.  As populations have grown people have found ways to extract more resources and increased efficiencies in their use (Boserup, 1965), allowing for a modification of the theoretical carrying capacity of Earth with increase populations (Ellis, 2013).  Limitless growth does seem implausibly and true a limit of resources is a concern to us all. People may have the ability to extend the capacity of Earth but a limit does exist.  So technical solutions to extend the carrying capacity of the planet cannot always be the solution (Hardin, 1968), sooner or latter population will have to be controlled, but is it necessary to control it by force? When examining populations in terms of growth rate as opposed to raw number, population looks more manageable with relatively small growth rates (World Bank, 1989).  These small rates translate to a sensitive process that can easily be changed.  Additionally, when comparing developed regions to developing ones, fertility rates have dropped drastically with emergence of stronger economies (Lewis, 2013).  While technology has lead to more effective extracting or resources, it is now impacting our social system.  People do not want to have large families and social changes that result from an advance economy maybe the solution to the population problem. The next problem is how to make the modern lifestyle less impactful on the environment, so as more people can live it without the environment going to ruin.

Works Cited

Boserup, E (1965). The .conditions of agricultural growth (pp. 41-42). Chicago: Aldine.

Ellis, E.C. (2013, 13 September). Overpopulation is not the problem. The New York Times.

Hardin, G. (1968). The tragedy of the commons. New York.

Lewis, M.W. (2013, 7 May). India’s plummeting birthrate: A television-induced transformation? Geocurrents

Malthus, T. P. (1998). An Essay on the Principle of Population. 1798. Reprint. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books.

World Bank. (1989). World development report 1989. New York: Published for the World Bank, Oxford University Press. Box 4.6 "Three Views of Population Change," P. 76Top of Form

Land Sparing and Sharing

How will the demands of growing populations for food be met?  Many believe that a modern agricultural system is required to meet the demand, but does a modern mechanized agricultural system have to be incompatible with the environment? When thinking about land-use patterns and the environment, development of modern intensive agriculture often equals lower environmental quality.  Intense agriculture can have negative external effects away from the farmland, e.g. dead zones, erosion deforestation, water contamination, algae blooms, and loss of biodiversity (Ewers et al., 2009), but does it have to be this way? What if it is possible to have high yield agriculture while reducing pressures on forest through requiring less land through increase production (Gutiérrez-Vélez et al., 2011). It is a challenge to combine efficient agricultural land-use with biodiversity conservation (Tscharntke et al, 2012), but two land systems processes being studied with potential for a win-win scenario is the concepts of Land Sparing and Land Sharing.

Land sharing and sparing are two types of land-use practices that focus on efficiently of agricultural land-use in order to have more land available for nature. Through intensification it is possible to reduce or eliminate the conversion of new cropland area that would otherwise be required to grow food.   The major difference between the two models is in the mix of land uses. In the land-sparing model the land-uses of agriculture and wild are segregated, while in land sharing the land-uses overlap (Phalan et al., 2011).  Land sharing is also known as wildlife friendly production, which is farming that happens within the wildlife fragmented in the habitat. Land sparing can be associated with the idea of nature preserves and conservation areas.

Satellite observations have shown evidence that it is possible to achieve the dual objectives of forest conservation and agricultural production (Macedo et al., 2011). In many ways these two models of land development are working to increase efficiency of production.  Land is an input into agricultural production like fertilizers and water, and using it more effectively can lead to high yields per acre, allowing for a great supply of land and reducing the demand on wild lands for conversion. In many ways through intensification the luxury of sparing or sharing land-use with the nature occurs.

Land sparing and sharing may not occur or is not perfect (Ewers et al., 2009). This is due to prices of goods decreasing with increase production, which will lead to an increased demand. To further complicate the land trends, high agricultural subsidies over-ride many land sparing activities that would otherwise occur (Ewers et al., 2009).  This is evident through history, as croplands have increased despite the advancement in crop yields.  Some of it is due to government subsidies are stimulating overproduction, because food production is often seen as national security.

Land-use policies are not the only solution and may not be as effective as other social solutions at eliminating world hunger. World hunger is linked to poverty not production, so many argue that solutions in production will not lead to the end of hunger, but broader social reforms are needed. Production levels do not necessarily have to increase, but reforms that prevent waste in the system and make food access more equitable can have a bigger impact.

Works Cited

Ewers, R. M., Scharlemann, J. P., Balmford, A., & Green, R. E. (2009). Do increases in agricultural yield spare land for nature?. Global Change Biology,15(7), 1716-1726.

Gutiérrez-Vélez, V. H., DeFries, R., Pinedo-Vásquez, M., Uriarte, M., Padoch, C., Baethgen, W., ... & Lim, Y. (2011). High-yield oil palm expansion spares land at the expense of forests in the Peruvian Amazon. Environmental Research Letters, 6(4), 044029.

Macedo, M. N., DeFries, R. S., Morton, D. C., Stickler, C. M., Galford, G. L., & Shimabukuro, Y. E. (2012). Decoupling of deforestation and soy production in the southern Amazon during the late 2000s. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 109(4), 1341-1346.

Phalan, B., Onial, M., Balmford, A., & Green, R. E. (2011). Reconciling food production and biodiversity conservation: land sharing and land sparing compared. Science, 333(6047), 1289-1291.

Tscharntke, T., Clough, Y., Wanger, T. C., Jackson, L., Motzke, I., Perfecto, I., ... & Whitbread, A. (2012). Global food security, biodiversity conservation and the future of agricultural intensification. Biological Conservation, 151(1), 53-59.

Small farm in a big world: globalization’s impact on Latin American food systems.

Agricultural systems are in a state of flux in Latin America providing both opportunities and pitfalls for farmers (Doolittle, 2002). This flux is a result of increased liberalization of economies coupled with globalization of market places. Access to global markets and industrial technologies can be a good thing for developing countries, especially at the macro level, but on the micro level of individual small farm holders it could mean the loss of livelihoods. Latin America is an urban place, with large urban populations relying on the food systems (Doolittle, 2002). This population dynamic has supported the rural farmer growing food for the urban populations, but as cheap food imports flood local markets, peasant and farm families can no longer compete and are driven from their lands (Campesina, 2000). Some argue that this can be a net environmental benefit, falling under a land sparing model, where intensive agriculture is concentrated and increased in production sparing the land for nature conservation (Grau & Aide, 2008). While social programs or practices like welfare and remittances are attributed as way to help support people left behind from this rapid economic change, it is not a sustainable solution because people take pride in working and self-reliance.  Some social rural movements are pushing for food sovereignty as an alternative, which focuses on local autonomy, local markets, local production/consumption cycles, energy and technological sovereignty and farmer-to-farmer networks (Altieri, 2008). This approach has positive aspects on the micro level, but is hard to argue for on the macro level. Successes like Argentina becoming the third largest producer of soybean in the world through liberal economic reforms of the 1990’s (Caceres et al., 2009) are hard for developmental leaders to ignore and instead adopt a protectionist and isolationist policy.  A true sustainable model for food production should engage global markets while supporting smallholders and protecting the environment.  Ironically while Latin America is adapting to industrial farming, developed countries like the United States and European Nations are struggling to support local and sustainable agriculture. Programs like community supported agriculture, farmers’ markets, and local/organic food movements could be solutions, which Latin American countries can adopt proactively instead of following the same development playbook as industrialized nations.

Works Cited

Altieri, M. A. (2008). Small farms as a planetary ecological asset: five key reasons why we should support the revitalisation of small farms in the global south. Third World network (TWN).

Cáceres, D., Silvetti, F., Díaz, S., Calvo, S., & Quétier, F. (2009). Environmental winners and losers in Argentina’s soybean boom. Applying Ecological Knowledge to Landuse Decisions, 65.

Campesina, V. (2000, October). Bangalore Declaration of the Via Campesina. In Declaration ar the Third International Conference of the Via Campesina (pp. 3-6).

Doolittle, W. (2002). Feeding a Growing Population on an Increasing Fragile Planet. Latin America in the 21st Centruy: Challenges and Solutions.

  

Grau, H. R., & Aide, M. (2008). Globalization and land-use transitions in Latin America. Ecology and Society, 13(2), 16.

Land dynamics: forest transition & indirect land use change

Land dynamics that form from the human-environment relationship in land change science can be surprising.  The landscape and the anthropogenic impacts to its composition are a complex relationship.  For example global demands on the environment are rising and their accompany stresses on the environment are expected to grow (Grau and Aide, 2008), but the land use systems are more complex then this simple relationship and they seem to offer a degree of resilience in accommodating these new pressures. At the same time if human policies are design in faulty ways environmental stresses can be intensified. The goal is to understand land dynamics in order to amplify land system resilience which decreasing human impacts.  This summary outlines two processes on the landscape in which better understanding can lead to better-regulated human-environment systems.  These processes are forest transition and indirect land use change.

Forest transition in is simplest terms is when a region of the world experiences a shifts from net deforestation to net reforestation (Meyfroidt et al., 2010; Pfaff and Walker, 2010).  This processes is surprising in that it can be seen to be an analogue with development. When countries are transition from subsistence to a developing economy, there are high rates of deforestation using the natural capital to industrialize and shift to manufacturing economy. This is accompanied by agricultural intensification leading to abandoned lands and beginning of forest recovery.  There is a growth of population in urban areas that interact with the global markets to satisfy consumption. Examples of countries currently going through forest transition are Costa Rica, Chile, El Salvador, Bhutan, China, India, and Vietnam.  Developed nations like the United States (US), France, and other European countries have already underwent forest transition.  Rapidly developing countries like Brazil, Indonesia, Cameroon, and Peru have had no forest transition, and still deforest at high rates.  This can be an attractive story line, that development would save the forests, but countries that are having forest transitions is a result of exporting the resource demands to other countries (Meyfroidt et al., 2010; Pfaff and Walker, 2010).   This outsourcing of forest related lands is more then just timber demands, but can also be agricultural demands.  Food and other natural resources that are not being produced in developed countries like France and the US are one of the mechanisms leading the reforestation trends.  Further more the intensification of agriculture, concentrating the production is sparing more land for transition (Grau and Aide, 2008).  This can have social impact divorcing people from land production leaving them out of work.  Higher skill labor is required in these new economies where people are replaced by machinery.  Social programs and remittances are ways the society resilience forms in this new paradigm.   The question is how to transition forests without outsourcing environmental degradation, and how to transform economies without leaving whole groups of people behind.  Policy is the solution in constructing constraints into development.

Regions of the world under heavy deforestation are under rapid development, but are trying to design policies to encourage forest transition.  Land conversion restrictions are one popular policy that on face value looks at responsible development. Lapola et al. (2010) analyzed one such program in the manufacturing of biofuels from soy.  In this case land use restrictions where applied that production of soy could not take place on lands that were not already degraded.  This restriction looked to stop forest conversion that would be driven by the development of biofuels.  The plan is faulty in that they did not take into account indirect land use change.  Development of biofuel production does not take place in an isolated world, but in the context of the whole economy.  Pricing current lands became more valuable in supplying the demand needed for biofuel production.  Other land uses were not restricted, simply displacing land use to other parts of the country, which normally resulted in deforestation.  Without a comprehensive approach the development of biofuels lead to indirect land-use change that made the policy design have little net environmental benefit. Smarter policy is needed, but without a complete understanding of land dynamics it is hard to design.

Landscape change and human use of the land adapt not only to the natural systems but also the social system.  Understanding land dynamics is important in order to design better policy.  Some activities can have indirect benefits of consequences, and designing a constrained system that works toward benefits can help in solving environmental problems.  There is a need to research in human use of the world in order to develop sustainably.

Works Cited

Grau, H. R., & Aide, M. (2008). Globalization and land-use transitions in Latin America. Ecology and Society, 13(2), 16.

Lapola, D. M., Schaldach, R., Alcamo, J., Bondeau, A., Koch, J., Koelking, C., & Priess, J. A. (2010). Indirect land-use changes can overcome carbon savings from biofuels in Brazil. Proceedings of the national Academy of Sciences, 107(8), 3388-3393.

Meyfroidt, P., Rudel, T. K., & Lambin, E. F. (2010). Forest transitions, trade, and the global displacement of land use. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 107(49), 20917-20922.

Pfaff, A., & Walker, R. (2010). Regional interdependence and forest “transitions”: Substitute deforestation limits the relevance of local reversals.Land Use Policy, 27(2), 119-129.

You are what you eat.

The famous phrase dates back to 1826 works of Brillat-Savarin who wrote, “Tell me what you eat and I will tell you what you are.” Since then the phrase has been applied to physiology in that if one eats wholesome foods, they will have a healthier life. The concept of ‘what you eat making who you are’ can go further then one’s physical health, but it can also be an expression of culture, morals, and identity. If people’s consumption of food (e.g. their choices and reactions) is an expression of culture (Douglas and Isherwood, 1979), then what does the modern food system say about our modern culture? In the modern food system the disconnection of people and food production has led to many corrupt practices. The problem of food security still exists, but now it has a counter part of over consumption.  At the macro-scale, greed and competition has led to produce an ‘at all costs’ mentality and uneven distribution of food resources.  Zooming into the microscale, people’s kitchens used to be an important place for cultural practices to be learned, taught, and continued (Christe, 2008), are now being replaced by microwaved meals and semi-prepared foods. While people have degraded their connection with food, resurgent consumers are demanding markets to change. Like in the case of social resistance to recombinant bovine growth hormone/bovine somatotropin (rBST) in milk production (Goodman and DuPuis, 2002), consumers demanded through purchasing preference against rBST treated milk, and the market answered through a volunteer halt of it use in most milk production. Consumption-based resistance is also leading to a revival of ancient grains in the modern market place (Healy, 2004).  It has resulted in alternative production methods like organic and Buen Vivir (see Gudynas, 2011).  A post-modern food system is one that responded to consumer demands and reflects society more clearly. People are not inherently greedy, wanting more at no costs; they make decisions within a moral framework.  Today, thanks to informed consumers making demands on the market, the food system is beginning to reflect our common morality.

Works Cited

Brillat-Savarin, J. A. (1826). Physiologie du goût ou méditations de gastronomie transcendante. A. Sautelet.

Christie, M. E. (2008). Kitchenspace: women, fiestas, and everyday life in central Mexico. U of Texas Press.

Douglas, M. & Isherwood, B. (1979). The world of goods: Towards an Anthropology of Consumption London: Allen Lane.

Goodman, D., & DuPuis, E. M. (2002). Knowing food and growing food: beyond the production–consumption debate in the sociology of agriculture. Sociologia ruralis, 42(1), 5-22.

Gudynas, E. (2011). Buen Vivir: Today's tomorrow. Development, 54(4), 441-447.

Healy, K. (2004) An Andean Food Revolution; bringing ancient nutrition to the modern marketplace. Native Americas, XXI(2), 46-51 (2004).

Rich in Natural Resources, Poor in Economic Development: The curse of natural resource-led development

The ‘resource curse’ is a conceptualization of the observation that countries rich in natural resources tend to have poorer economies (Sachs and Warner, 2001). Natural resource based economic growth may appear to be a pathway of development (e.g. utilizing natural capital to attract foreign investment, build capacity, and transition to export-based growth), but paradoxically this development often has adverse social and environmental impacts. Almost in every case since the 1970s, resource-abundant countries have languished in economic growth, even when controlling for many geographic and climatic variables (Sachs and Warner, 2001). Mining in Latin America is an excellent case study of natural resource led development. Many institutions that can ensure responsible development of mines are often not in place or very weak, further more money generated by mining is often weak at transforming mineral wealth into human development (Bebbington and Bury, 2009). This points towards a world systems theory argument (Wallerstein, 2011) that these natural resources are utilized to export to ‘core countries’, while serving little to improve ‘periphery countries’. One approaches to protect economies when developing of natural resources is through nationalization. Nationalized resources belong to a people, and managed by the government in order for the betterment of them, not exploited for the benefit of a few private interests (Perreault, 2006). Nationalizing, however, has led to corruption or the use of natural resources for political gain as opposed to economic benefit. Developing sustainability enhancing, resource governance institutions before resource-based growth occurs maybe the key (Bebbington and Bury, 2009). With many poorer countries rich in natural resources, it is imperative to better grasp the origins of failure in natural resource-led development (Sachs and Warner, 2001). While natural resources maybe a curse, they still offer an attractive promise for development. The question remains how to constrain the development towards good.

Works Cited

Bebbington, A. J., & Bury, J. T. (2009). Institutional challenges for mining and sustainability in Peru. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,106(41), 17296-17301.

Perreault, T. (2006). From the Guerra Del Agua to the Guerra Del Gas: resource governance, neoliberalism and popular protest in Bolivia. Antipode,38(1), 150-172.

Sachs, J. D., & Warner, A. M. (2001). The curse of natural resources.European economic review, 45(4), 827-838.

Wallerstein, I. (2011). The Modern World-System I: Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the European World-Economy in the Sixteenth Century, With a New Prologue (Vol. 1). University of California Pr.