I cannot say with honesty that the trip to Sainsburys is the highlight of my week. But this Saturday morning it seemed even more depressing than usual. The shelves were piled high with mangoes flown in from Spain, avocados from Mexico, beans from Kenya, bottles of wine from Chile, and whole range of tacky Halloween gear made in China, which will no doubt be worn once and then thrown onto the rubbish heap.
The problem was I had spent the previous evening reading the United Nations report on the future of the world, and this is some wake-up call. Entitled Global Environment Outlook 4, it is a truly shocking read.
Its conclusion is simple and stark. That the earth’s ecosystem cannot sustain the economic aspirations of its increasing human population. It cites Mesopotamia as a kingdom that was destroyed by overcrowding and excessive irrigation, which ultimately led to the soil being ruined by salty seawater. And it leaves us in no doubt that where Mesopotamia went the modern world could very easily follow if governments do not pull their fingers out and take the matter more seriously.
The study is useful in that it brings together all the many environmental issues that we read about each day, and explains how they are related. For instance the chapter on biodiversity reminds us that just as vegetation protects against landslides, so bacteria and microbes transform waste into usable products and filter pollutants from air and water; insects pollinate plants; coral reefs and mangrove swamps protect the coastline.
Every creature and every plant contributes something to world’s ecosystem. But we are now destroying species at an unprecedented rate. ‘Of the major vertebrate groups that have been comprehensively assessed’, says the UN, ‘over 30% of amphibians, 23% of mammals and 12% of birds are threatened.’ This it describes as the ‘sixth major extinction’, with the difference being that this is the first caused by humans, through population growth and our consumption patterns.
Population growth is the heart of the problem. I don’t know what you were doing twenty years ago, but in the brief expanse of time since the world’s population has increased by one-third. Global trade has trebled, and although income per head has gone up by 40%, this extra wealth has been most unevenly distributed, and has done huge environmental damage.
First of all to the atmosphere. Since 1987 CO2 emissions have also increased by one third. The global average temperature has increased by 0.74% over the last century, but is projected to rise by between 1.8ºC and 4ºC in the next hundred years. While not unequivocally blaming human activity for global warming, the UN describes this view as the consensus. Now some scientists believe that a rise in the global temperature of more than 2ºC could usher in an accelerating and vicious cycle of irreversible damage. To prevent this, developed countries must reduce harmful emissions by 60%-80% by 2050.
The dangers of intensive farming
Aside from the impact of climate change, land is suffering from intensive farming. Back in 1987 a hectare of cropland yielded 1.8 tonnes of food. Today the figure is 2.5 tonnes. But this has been achieved largely through the application of nitrogen fertilizers and irrigation. The former degrades the soil while the latter diverts water supplies. One in ten of the world’s major rivers fail to reach the sea for part of the year, because of upstream irrigation.
By 2025 1.8 billion people will live in countries where water is scarce. Water quality is declining, too, causing death through waterborne diseases and destroying marine ecosystems. The population of freshwater vertebrates has declined by 50% since 1987, while the demand for fish to feed the increasing population is affecting marine life. The oceans are the main regulator of climate change but they too are being affected, and their ability to absorb massive quantities of greenhouse gas is now being questioned. ‘Increasing understanding of how people relate to biodiversity, and how to move towards greater stewardship of biodiversity, may be the biggest question the world must still answer,’ says the UN.
An understanding of the problem would be a help, but what is really needed is action. The problem is so vast that it is hard to know where to start. What is more you can easily get into circular arguments, along the lines of ‘If everybody walked to school instead of going by car, we would reduce carbon emissions… but then we would all become hungrier and more food would have to be produced to satisfy our appetites – at the expense of the soil and our water supply…etc etc’. But we must start somewhere and given that the root of the problem is the rising number of people that the earth is being asked to support, the obvious place is population control.
More specifically the UN says that ‘subsidies have created excess fishing capacity, estimated at 250% more than is needed to catch the oceans’ sustainable production.’ So let’s regulate fishing – this should not be too difficult. Let us also pick up on another point raised by the UN and ban the use of the those gases used in refrigeration and air-conditioning that destroy the ozone layer. Harmless alternatives are now available.
And finally let us put a stop to this crazy and rather repulsive practice of transporting food and drink from one corner of the earth to another, just to satisfy the cravings of those people wealthy enough to have a jaded palate. In the period 1990 to 2003 aviation saw an 80% increase in distances flown, while in fifteen years the tonnage of goods carried by sea rose from 4bn tonnes to 7.1bn. While there is plenty of talk about people flying unnecessarily, we hear far less about the transport of goods. I would advocate huge tariffs on imports of food. The cost to the environment is simply not properly reflected in the price that we pay in the supermarkets.
Somebody, no doubt, will now tell me that such a move would harm the interests of the developing countries from which we import all this stuff. But we must start with some common sense policies, and I say that this would be one.
This article is taken from Tom Bulford’s free daily email ‘Penny Sleuth’.