Can Earth's and Society's Systems Meet the Needs of 10 Billion People? Summary of a Workshop (2014) / Chapter Skim
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3 Challenges to the Earth System: Character and Magnitude of the Challenges in 2050
3 Challenges to the Earth System: Character and Magnitude of the Challenges in 2050
Pages 25-36
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From page 25... ...
DEMOGRAPHIC TRENDS AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES John Bongaarts Vice President and Distinguished Scholar, Population Council John Bongaarts noted the extraordinary demographic changes in recent history. The most obvious is the rise in population numbers (an increase of 5 billion since 1950)
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Europe's population is expected to decline overall, with declining European nations outpacing growing ones. Bongaarts pointed out that the United Nations produces high-, medium-, and low-variant projections by changing the assumptions about future fertility rates.
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Group 1 nations tend to experience depletion of natural resources; increased pollution; high unemployment; high maternal and infant mortality; lagging government investments in education, health services, and infra structure; and rising political unrest and crime due in part to the unemployment of young people. • Group 2: Characterized by lower fertility rates, lower population growth rates, and fewer young people.
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From page 28... ...
DEMOGRAPHIC AND ECONOMIC DRIVERS OF CONSUMPTION AND ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE Andrew Jorgenson, Professor and Director of Graduate Studies, Sociology Department, University of Utah (presenter) , and Juliet Schor, Professor, Sociology Department, Boston College (co-author)
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From page 29... ...
Jorgenson then discussed affluence, noting that the traditional IPAT literature does not cover much discussion of heterogeneity in the effects of affluence or population size. He showed elasticity coefficients that result from statistical modeling of carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels, looking at the population effects on emissions.
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From page 30... ...
He stressed examining regional effects, but said the overall increasing trend between GDP and ecological intensity of well-being was a troubling one. Jorgenson recognized the growing environmental concern among individuals in nations throughout the world and asked how to convert that concern into behaviors and actions, both individual and collective, to help address broader sustainability issues.
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in some parts of the rapidly developing world, noting 20 percent of the global urban population does not currently have access to an adequate water supply. The developed world will likely experience growing infrastructure deficits as older systems deteriorate.
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Marcotullio cautioned that, at the same time, efficiency gains may be overshadowed by the scale of urban expansion, as seen in the "rebound effect" in the United States after the 1970s oil shortages. During the late 1970s and early 1980s, transportation figures demonstrated that motor vehicle drivers dramatically reduced fuel consumption through higher efficiency cars and reduced driving.
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From page 33... ...
The Iranian government instituted a family planning program that provided many options and was accessible to rural populations. Fertility rates in Iran dropped from 6 to 2 within a decade.
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Bongaarts said, to an economist, the demographic dividend was only positive because it results in a decline of the poor populations and motivates governments to help decrease fertility rates. The downside is that the effect lasts for only a few decades, and then it shifts to the demographic burden of an aging population.
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From page 35... ...
However, another participant referred to a 2006 report by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, which stated that the total environmental impact of livestock is larger than that of the transportation industry (Steinfeld et al., 2006)
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