Environmental Degradation by Population Growth

To most of the people growth of human population at alarming rate at least in the present century is the most significant cause of the lowering of environment quality and ecological balance. In fact, there are conflicting ideas and views regarding the exact principal cause of environmental degradation wherein the lowering of environmental quality and ecological imbalance have been assigned to overpopulation, or to the failures of the social system or to modern technologies.

The PRO_POPULATION SCHOOL is of the opinion that the growth of world population at exponential rate is the only reason of environmental degradation while other reasons are offshoots of the factor of over population. Industrial expansion, urban growth, agricultural development, increase in means of transport and communication etc. are the results of population growth because the people must generate better facilities for their existence and better life. The development of scientific techniques and advanced technologies has to be done in order to save the humanity from hunger and natural calamity and disaster. Thus it is obvious without doubt that over population is the root cause of environmental degradation and ecological imbalance.

 Ever increasing population place greater demands on the finite resources of the earth. The rate of exploitation of natural resources increases more rapidly than the rate of population growth. This has caused and is causing exhaustion of certain valuable non-renewable resources. It is desirable to know some of the characteristic features of world population before assessing the impact of population growth on the environment.