Humans – biggest threat to environment 

The earth’s most distinctive resource may soon prove to be the cause of its destruction. There are just too many people for it to survive, scientists fear, report PTI.

            “No problem may be more threatening to the earth’s environment than the proliferation of the human species”, a group of well-known scientists and administrators from five continents said at a conference on environment organised by the Time magazine.

            Today the planet holds more then five billion people. During the next century, the world double, with 90% of that growth occurring in poorer, developing countries, the participants warned.

            “In India 37% of the people cannot buy enough food to sustain themselves”, Mr. B. B. Vohra, Vice-chairman of the Himachal Pradesh State Land-use Board, told the conference.

            The magazine, instead of naming a “man of the year” has designated endangered earth as the “plant of the year” for 1988. The three-day environment conference was attended among other by Mr. Fyodor Morgun, Chairman, State Committee for Environmental Protection, USSR, Mr. Thomas Lovejoy of the Smithsonian Institute and Mr. Timothy Wirtha, U.S. Senator.

            Prospect have been found to be so dire that environmentalists have urged the world to adopt the goal of cutting in half the earth’s population growth rate during the next decade.

            “That means a call for a two-child family for the world as a whole. In some countries there may be need to set a goal of one child per family,” Mr. Lester Brown, President of the World Watch Institute observed.

            Scientists emphasized the need for Governments to raise public awareness and rally support for population control with a cohesive message about the dangers of rampant growth.

            “India, one of the first countries to adopt a family planning programme, some 30 years ago, failed to forge a national will for the task and the population is now growing at 2% a year,” Time said.

            Referring to china’s “one family, one child” policy, the magazine said the country’s efforts had distressing consequences. “Women have been coerced into having abortions, and there have been reports of female infanticide by parents determined that their one child should be a boy.”

            The aim of the Chinese family policy, launched in 1979, was to contain population at 1.2billion by 2000.

            According to surveys by the United Nations and other agencies, half the 463 million married women in developing countries (excluding China) do not want more children. Yet many have little or no access to effective methods of birth control.

            The World Bank says that to make birth control readily available on a global basis would required the 3 billion dollars spent currently every year on family planning services to be increased to 8 billion dollars by the year 2000.

            Time quoted Mr. Bruce Wilcox, Presidents of the institute for sustainable development, an environmental research body, as saying that solution to the population challenge would demand “fundamental changes in society.”

            Mr. Wilcox noted that ingrained culture attitudes that promote high birth rates would have to be challenged. “Many families in poor agrarian societies, for example, see children as a source of labour and a hedge against poverty in old age. People need to be taught that with lower infant mortality, fewer offspring can provide the same measure of security.”

            Scientist and environmentalist noted that of all entrenched values, religion presented perhaps the greatest obstacle to population control. “Religious objections need not entirely thwart population planning. Where such resistance is encountered vigorous campaigns should be mounted to promote natural birth control techniques”. They said.

                                                                        The Statesman, December 27, 1988