The Human Population Supplemental Lecture on Population for Human Geography: People, Places, and Lan

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The Human PopulationSupplemental Lecture on
Populationfor Human Geography People, Places,
and Landscapes
Save the Planet? or Save the Playground?     Some
musings on the role of Population Growth
Behavior on the Human Dimensions of Global Change

• Paul Sutton
• psutton_at_du.edu
• Department of Geography
• University of Denver
• May, 2000

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The Ghosts of Population Past

•  
• 3 million years ago Australopithecus
• Homo Habilis (tool maker)
• Homo Erectus
• 1 million years ago - Homo Sapiens (archaic)
• 200,000 years ago Homo Sapiens (modern)
• coexisted with
• Homo Sapiens (Neandertal)
• 35,000 years ago Homo Sapiens replace
  Neandertals
• 10,000 years ago - The agricultural revolution
• 200 years ago - The Industrial revolution
• 30 years ago - The green revolution
• The present (6 billion and counting)
•  

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The Souls of Population Present

• Some Introductory Questions
• 1)   How many people live on the Earth Right now?
• 2)   What is the annual Percentage Growth rate of
  the Planet?
• 3)   If this rate remained constant, how long
  would it take for the Earths population to
  double? (the rule of 72)
• 4)   How many people are added to the Earths
  Population
•  
• Every Year? __________ Every Day?____________
•  
• Every Hour?__________ Every Second?__________
• 5) How many abortions happen every year?

6 Billion
1.4
51 Years
84,000,000
230,000
10,000
3
50,000,000
4
Whats in store for future populations?
Is this graph possible? What does zero
population growth mean? What does a sustainable
economy look like? What does the graph imply
about total population?
Three Principles and a guideline Sustainability,
Efficiency, Equity Carrying Capacity
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Human Population Milestones

• 1800 human population reaches 1 Billion
• 1930 human population reaches 2 Billion
• 1960 human population reaches 3 Billion
• 1975 human population reaches 4 Billion
• 1987 human population reaches 5 Billion
• 1999 human population reaches 6 Billion
•  
• My father was born in 1926. Of these 6 milestones
  he saw
• The world reach 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 Billion (5 out
  of 6)

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The History of Human Population Growth
Human beings mammals of the 50 kilogram
weight class and members of a group, the
primates, otherwise noted for scarcity have
become a hundred times more numerous than any
other land animal of comparable size in the
history of life. By every conceivable measure,
humanity is ecologically abnormal. Our species
appropriates between 20 and 40 per cent of the
solar energy captured in organic material by land
plants. There is no way that we can draw upon the
resources of the planet to such a degree without
drastically reducing the state of most other
species.   From E.O. Wilsons book The
Diversity of Life
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Cultural or Biological Evolution?
The demographic transition theory can be
perceived as a transition from biological
evolution to cultural evolution. However it does
not happen everywhere for the same reasons .
Will many other organisms cease to evolve
because we fail to complete the demographic
transition?
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Social Consequences of Population Growth

• The academic community has been particularly
  negligent in addressing itself to the political
  dimension of the population issue. As a result, a
  curious division between apocalyptical and
  apolitical orientations has developed and is
  contributing increasingly to our singular lack of
  empirical knowledge regarding the political
  consequences of population dynamics. Indeed one
  of the most serious limitations of contemporary
  political analysis lies in the too frequent
  separation of politics from its demographic
  context.
• (Nazli Choucri Population Dynamics and
  International Violence) 
• Tentative Findings 
• 1)     Population dynamics are related to 2)
  Population Growth is linked to
• Inter-National Conflict
  Intra-National Conflict
• El Salvador Honduras (1969) Between
  1980 1991 the following countries
• India-Pakistan (on-going) had civil wars and
  population growth rates
• Sino-Soviet (1970s) in excess of 3 per year
•   Arab-Israeli (on-going)
• Ethiopia Nicaragua Rwanda Yemen
  Tajikstan

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Economic Consequences of Population Growth

• Typically economists avoid discussion of the role
  of population growth on economic analyses. In
  fact much of economic theory is premised on an
  ever-growing economy. Nonetheless.
•  
• Tentative Conclusions
• High rates of population growth cause.
• 1)   Reduced investments in human capital
• 2)   Increased poverty and unemployment
• CAPITAL rules in a glutted labor market
• 3)   Reduced levels of Savings and Investment
• 4) Degraded and Depleted Natural Resources
• National Research Council Conclusion
• High Population Growth rates reduce per capita
  GDP
•  
• Differential Rates of Population Growth
• The rich get richer and the poor have children
•  
• ----------So what? Why do we care? Pakistan
  toilet story--------
•  
• The role of Institutions in economic development,

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The Critical Role of Institutions

• The debate over the economic impacts of
  contemporary human population growth is not just
  about people, but about modern institutions and
  their capacities to deal with rapid social and
  ecological change. Institutions mediate
  relationships between people. They convey
  signals, channeling human activity by
  facilitating or rewarding some behaviors while
  obstructing or punishing others. In economic
  terms, institutions manipulate transaction
  coststhe costs of defining, establishing and
  maintaining property rights. Reducing transaction
  costs increases the ratio of benefits to costs,
  making it more likely that the desired
  transactions occur. Raising transaction costs
  makes these transactions less likely.
• The most fundamental institutionsmarkets, law,
  property rights---evolved with human culture.
  Others were forged more deliberately as products
  of state policies and reforms. These include
  codes and norms for savings and finance systems,
  systems of formal education, transportation and
  communications networks, public health systems,
  and international trade. Like valves in a
  hydraulic system, an economys institutions
  regulate how resources, goods, services and
  opportunities reach people---and, critically,
  which people they reach. When modern macro-level
  institutions function well, they can impart
  flexibility to an economy and transmit widespread
  benefits. How each nation fares as it undergoes
  the changes and stresses brought about by
  population growth depends, at least in part, upon
  the nature of its institutions.
• The study of institutions has a long history in
  economics. Classical economists of 18th and 19th
  century Europe provided extensive commentary and
  critique on the institutions of their day,
  including those involved in governance, trade,
  labor practices (wage labor, servitude, and
  slavery), tenancy, colonialism, and theocratic
  power. However, interest in the broad spectrum of
  institutions waned toward the end of the 19th
  century with the emergence of early neoclassical
  economic theory, a mathematical treatment of
  relationships principally related to a single
  institution the market. Over the past two
  decades, however, interest in institutions has
  re-emerged. Now, more than ever, social
  scientists credit modern institutions with a
  fundamental role in the formation and stability
  of nation states. Many economists see
  institutions, when linked to technology and human
  creativity, as the principal engines of economic
  growth during this past century and a source of
  economic resilience. By this view, institutions
  permit economies to adapt to social and
  environmental change, such as those to which
  population growth contributes.
•  
• Institutions Greatly Challenged by Population
  Growth
• Fishery Management Freshwater Provision
  Public Health
•  
• With strictly economics to guide human action,
  Central Park would not exist.

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Efficiency (a neo-classical economic goal)

• Definition
• In economic terms an efficient distribution of a
  fixed total quantity of goods is one in which it
  is not possible, through any change in the
  distribution, to benefit one person without
  making some other person being made worse off
• Caveat Efficiency does not take into
  consideration the distribution of wealth among
  the people of a nation or between nations.
• Questions that arise
• 1)    Q Country A has tons of water and no good
  soil to raise crops. Next door, Country B has
  tons of good soil but no water. Is an exchange
  efficient? (A yes)
• This is a good argument for efficiency. However,
  the following two questions raise questions about
  sustainability and equity. Strict neo-classical
  economic analysis prizes efficiency above all.
  This, I believe is a problem.
• 2)    Q Is it efficient for a farmer to grow
  food for a starving mass of poor people in his
  own country if they dont have any money? (A No)
• Right or Wrong? Overpopulation or
  Maldistributed wealth?
• 3) Is it efficient for the U.S. to dump
  radioactive waste in a poor South Pacific island
  nation if it pays them and the island nation
  agrees to the exchange? (A Yes)
• Economic and environmental exploitation can
  result from vast differentials in the
  distribution of wealth between nations.

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Ecological and Environmental Impacts of the Human
Population

• The Atmosphere
• The Lithosphere
• The Hydrosphere
• The Biosphere

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Human Impacts on the Atmosphere

• Nitrogen, Oxygen, and inert noble gases
  (primarily argon) have remained in near-constant
  absolute and relative concentration in the
  atmosphere for the full history of human
  presence. A surprising element of human impact on
  the atmosphere is the fact that the impact is
  almost exclusively upon the concentration of
  trace gases that are measured in parts per
  billion (ppb) and parts per trillion (ppt). This
  remaining 0.1 of the atmosphere consists of a
  large and diverse number of molecules of great
  importance because they are capable of
  influencing and/or controlling significant
  atmospheric processes Graedel, 1990.
• A)    The obscure chemical called a
  chloroflurorcarbon and the Ozone Hole
• Q What other obscure things are happing that
  we dont know about?
•  
• B)    Svante Arrhenius prediction of global
  warming 100 years ago
• Q Can we prove it yet?
•  
• C) An obscure story about the Nitrogen Cycle and
  the Haber Process
• Q What are the long term implications
  for tweaking the N cycle that much?
•  

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Human Impacts on the Lithosphere

•  Since 1700 the following land cover changes can
  be attributed to humans
• A)    19 of the worlds forests are gone
• B)     8 of grasslands and pasturelands are
  gone
• C)   Cropland has increased by 466
• The state of the worlds soils as a result of
  human activity
• A)   39 are only minimally impacted by
  anthropogenic changes to the atmosphere (e.g.
  acid rain, etc) however, these soils are mostly
  in high mountains and arctic tundra
• B)   20 of the worlds soils have had the biota
  that live on them dramatically altered by human
  activity, although the soil itself remains fairly
  intact. These tend to be rangelands, pastures,
  and meadows.
• D)    10 are significantly impacted via soil
  erosion and chemical inputs. These are many of
  the present day agricultural lands.
• E)    7 are soils that have been severely
  damaged or destroyed by human activity up to the
  state of sterility. Examples would be badlands,
  shifting sands and desert pavement.
• F) 5 of the soils have been completely
  transformed to human uses such as urban areas,
  roads, and resevoirs. These soils are unlikely to
  ever return to agricultural productivity without
  a decrease in human numbers.
• Soil is being destroyed so much faster than it is
  being
• replenished it can be considered a non-renewable
  resource.

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Human Impact on the Earths Landcover

• Anthropogenic processes have damaged up to 13
  of the worlds land to the extent of almost total
  loss of their original productivity. This
  constitutes an area larger than that of the
  present arable land. Remembering that these
  estimates are controversial, we suggest that
  large fractions of the world land surface have
  been damaged in such major ways as to be
  basically useless for agriculture (crops and
  livestock)., constituting an area about the size
  of Africa. The effects of these impacts are
  illustrated in the following world estimates (1)
  about 15 million km2 of land (nearly 10 of the
  global land area, and larger than Antarctica) are
  under permanent cultivation at present (2) about
  20 million km2 (an area larger than South
  America) of formerly productive land were
  irreversibly lost, whether transformed into
  badlands and deserts or covered with water,
  buildings, or asphalt pavements in the past
  10,000 years of agricultural civilization. (3)
  about only 10 million km2 (approximately the area
  of Europe) of land suitable for agriculture
  remain as an arable land reserve of human
  development, being scattered in small patches
  throughout the continents and occupying more or
  less larger areas in savannas and forests of
  Africa and South America and (4) todays annual
  irreversible loss of productive land amounts to
  60 to 70,000 km2 (the area of Sierra Leone), a
  rate 30 to 35 times higher than the average
  historical losses for the 10,000 year period.
  (from the earth as transformed by human action)
• The surface of the earth or lithosphere if you
  will is undoubtedly being dramatically
  transformed by the human race. As we seek more
  arable land to feed our growing population an
  ever-increasing amount of it is being paved over
  in urban areas for simply housing the growing
  population. The rates of urbanization,
  desertification, deforestation, and soil erosion,
  are all accelerating. The combined effect of
  human transformation of the atmosphere,
  hydrosphere, and lithosphere is a dramatic change
  to the biosphere.

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Human Impacts on the Hydrosphere

• Many people feel limits on freshwater will be
  humanitys
• canary in the coal mine
•  
• Let us take an extreme example the exploitation
  of groundwater resources in the oil-rich kingdom
  of Saudi Arabia. Most of Saudi Arabia is desert,
  so that climatic conditions are not favorable for
  rapid large -scale recharge of aquifers. Also,
  much of the groundwater that lies beneath the
  desert is a fossil resource, created during more
  humid conditions - pluvial - that existed in the
  Late Pleistocene, between 15,000 and 30,000 years
  ago. In spite of these inherently unfavorable
  circumstances, Saudi Arabias demand for water is
  growing inexorably as its economy develops. In
  1980 the annual demand was 2.4 Billion cubic
  meters. By 1990 it had reached 12 billion cubic
  meters ( a fivefold increase in just a decade),
  and it is expected to reach 20 billion by 2010.
  Only a very small part of the demand can be met
  from desalination plants or surface runoff over
  three-quarters of the supply is obtained from
  predominantly non-renewable groundwater
  resources. The drawdown on aquifers is thus
  enormous. It has been calculated that by 2010 the
  deep aquifers will contain 42 percent less water
  than in 1985. Much of the water is used
  ineffectively and inefficiently in the
  agricultural sector Al-Ibrahim, 1991 231, to
  irrigate crops that could easily be grown in more
  humid regions and then imported
•  
• What about the Ogallala aquifer? 
• What about Santa Barbaras contaminated beaches?
•  

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Debates about the social, economic, and
environmental Consequences of human population
growth have raged for centuries. The figure on
the right summarizes some of the diverse
perspectives that have arisen from these dialogs.
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Carrying Capacity

• A definition
• '...the concept of population-carrying capacity
  the maximum population that can be sustained
  indefinitely in to the future. Srinivasan, 1988
  296
• Global Estimates of Carrying Capacity over the
  years
•  

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Sustainable Development
  Development that meets the needs of the
present generation without compromising the
ability of the future generations to meet their
own needs.
This simple definition /sentence has spawned
research industries, international debates, and
considerable attention. A formal, explicit, and
practical definition of sustainable has yet to
be identified. Nonetheless, Bruntland must be
credited for causing a profound shift in the
collective consciousness of the human race for
coining such a phrase.
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Equity (What is Fair?) There are rational rules
to define sustainability. There are rational
rules to define efficiency. There are no rational
rules to define equity. Defining Equity is a
collective social choice based on ethics and
morality. The American Colonists used MORAL
arguments to declare the fundamental rights to
Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.
(and, they based it originally on land ownership
if I recall correctly-back to that later) The
United Nations Universal declaration of Human
Rights is not based on a rational choice but a
moral one.
The Golden Rule  Version 1 Do unto others as
you would have them do unto you. Version 2
He whos got the gold makes the rules. Q
What is the gold?, who owns it?, who
should?   My answer The land is the gold.
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A better definition of Carrying Capacity?

•  Balancing Human Impacts and Need for Resources
• with
• The Earths ability to absorb impact and provide
  Resources
•  
• The concepts of Natural Capital and the interest
  it accrues
• The idea of Ecosystem Services
• The concept of Human Impact I P A T
• The Equity Question and the idea of Relative
  Carrying Capacity
• Normative Statement The people of Botswana are
  entitled to the proportion of the earths natural
  capital that Botswana contains 
• Policy Implications Botswanas proportion of the
  Earths natural capital must be measured as well
  as the impact of Botswanas population on the
  earth