Incoherent Policies

While visiting in Australia three headlines caught my eye. They were reported as completely independent issues; one did not affect the other. The first stated that the baby bonuses of $5000 per child, which were started in 2004, are working: there has been a measurable increase in births. The second reported that the water supply for Adelaide and the surrounding region of South Australia was in crisis and unless drastic action is taken serious water shortages will start soon. The third stated that immigration, after holding steady for decades, would be cut by 14 percent (from 135,000 to 115,000) to help protect Australian workers in this recession.
Australia is a large country with a low population (about 20 million). Nevertheless, population should be a national issue that is addressed in a coherent and integrated manner. These newspaper reports clearly show that this is not the case. The baby-bonus and immigration policies are in direct conflict with each other. For the Adelaide water shortage, it is not even recognized that the large and growing population contributes to the problem. All the blame is placed on the drought and non of the proposed solutions suggests curbing population growth.
I am not picking on Australia for most nations are in the same boat. For example, the US southwest, notably Phoenix and Las Vegas, are suffering similar troubles as Adelaide. With human population approaching seven billion, the globe is experiencing severe shortages in many resources including fisheries, oil and gas, water and more. I won’t even touch on global warming.
It is time to recognize that human population is a serious, if not the most serious, problem the world faces. National and international policies are needed to address this issue. These policies must be coherent and integrated with all the relevant issues.

Suzuki on Population

Recently I had the privilege of interviewing Canada’s leading environmental expert, the internationally renowned David Suzuki,. When I turned the topic to global overpopulation I expected to hear the same waffle that virtually all politicians and economists spout. My expectation was based on the Suzuki Foundation website and discussions with several Foundation managers: in no way whatsoever does population play a part of their campaigns or strategy. The topic is shunned, as it is by virtually all environmental organizations.

To my surprise Suzuki discussed the issue openly and frankly. “A growing population makes almost every environmental problem worse,” he said. He was careful to distinguish between the different problems that face developed and developing nations. The footprint of a North American is many times that of someone from China or India he emphasized, so consumption is a big part of the equation. Suzuki feels Canadians and Americans need to decrease their environmental footprint by 80%. That’s a deep and painful cut that can’t be achieved without also decreasing population growth.

The populations of Canada and the United States, with less than 2.2 births per woman, will stabilize. But immigration, which makes up two-thirds of population growth, is a problem. Suzuki feels immigration should be decreased because it increases the ecofootprint of the immigrants to North American levels. A better method, he suggests, is to decrease immigration and spend far more on foreign aid, especially for womens’ education. He’s upset that there is not a single committee on population in federal government and says, “it’s a disgrace that Canada [and the United States] has no national population policy.”

When I asked about the future, Suzuki responded, “The world is going down the chute,” he said, “I’m old so it doesn’t matter to me. But it pisses me off that our grandchildren
will be affected.” It gave me a chill that one of the world’s most respected environmentalist has such a negative outlook.

For long-term survival it’s vital that we move to living in a state of equilibrium. And that includes consumption and population.