The Growth Machine

Population

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23 Feb 2009

The human population is close to 7 billion, and is rising by 80 million every year. We are already over-consuming the world's natural resources by 30%, which raises the question: what will happen when the population rises to 8 or 10 billion as is predicted? Food and fuel are not infinite - no matter what we do to become sustainable, too many people using too few resources can't work.

It's a difficult fact to digest, but a healthy future planet will not only need smaller ecological footprints, but fewer footprints altogether.

Take a look at these population statistics over the past century:

1901: 1.4 billion
1960: 3 billion
1987: 5 billion
1999: 6 billion

The rate of increase in human numbers since the beginning of the 20th century is dramatic and is showing few signs of slowing down in the 21st century. This is an issue that nobody wants to own because there's nothing more troubling to humans than accepting that we need fewer humans - and even if we did accept this, how would we go about making it happen?

Young people are at the forefront of this issue, not just because they are the ones who will have to inherit an overcrowded planet, but because they are the ones who can, to some extent, control future numbers by the choices they make.

Older generations tend to be stuck in the bigger, better, more belief system which has seen the developed world prosper over the past 100 years, but younger generations are living in a world which is learning to put less emphasis on blind growth and prosperity and more emphasis on sustainability, survival and quality of life.

So what is being done and what can you do? Share you ideas with Our Future Planet