At the root of much of the concern about the environment
is the worry that global population growth could
eventually outstrip the capacity of the world to feed itself.
Concern over excessive population growth, of course,
dates back to the fears expressed in the early nineteenth
century by the British economist Thomas Malthus, who
worried that population growth would increase more rapidly
than food supply. It peaked in the decades immediately
following World War II, when a rise in world birthrates
and a decline in infant mortality combined to fuel a
dramatic increase in population in much of the Third
World. The concern was set aside for a period after the
1970s, when the Green Revolution improved crop yields
and statistical evidence appeared to suggest that the rate
of population growth was declining in many countries of
Asia and Latin America.
Yet some experts question whether increases in food
production through technological innovation (in recent
years, the Green Revolution has been supplemented by a
“Blue Revolution” to increase food yields from the world’s
oceans, seas, and rivers) can keep up indefinitely with
world population growth, which continues today, though
at a slightly reduced rate from earlier levels. From a total
of 2.5 billion people in 1950, world population rose to
5.7 billion in 1995 and is predicted to reach ten billion in
the middle of this century. Today, many eyes are focused
on India, where the population recently surpassed one billion,
and on China, where family planning programs have
lost effectiveness in recent years and where precious rice
lands have been turned to industrial or commercial use.
World History
