Environmental Science - Essay Example

RUNNING HEAD The Question of a Sustainable Environment The Question of a Sustainable Environment in the Present ContextThe Question of a Sustainable Environment in the Present Context On the 4th May 2008, The Hindustan Times, a leading newspaper of India carried headlines saying," Food prices pushed up by booming India: Bush", while another leading newspaper , The Times of India said ,"Netas choke on Bush's Food Facts". Both the newspapers were reporting the comments made by President Bush the previous day in Missouri, while addressing an interactive session on economy.

Apparently he said that one of the causes of the present food crisis was the demand for better food of the newly prosperous middle class of India "which is larger than our entire population". President Bush refused to admit that ethanol could be a factor for the food crisis. Understandably, there was an angry response from the Indian intelligentsia, some of them calling Bush an imperialist, while many others blamed America for being the cause of the food crisis by its diversion of grains for manufacturing biofuels.

The burgeoning population of the less developed countries like India and China has always been a favorite butt for some scientists and politicians to blame for all the ills of the world from climate change to the food crisis. They quote the Malthusian catastrophe, but according to Paul and Anne Ehrlich, all the developed, rich nations can be called overpopulated because they are using up the resources of the planet rapidly. (Ehrlich & Ehrlich 1990). The poorer societies make do with much less.

The consumer oriented life style of the developed nations , with their hunger for more and more energy is responsible for the depletion of resources and the environmental degradation of the planet. Rainforests of the Amazon basin are being destroyed to produce ethanol, to fuel the energy hungry West. Michael Grunwald in his article "The Clean Energy Scam" , published in the Time magazine says, "Brazil now ranks fourth in the world in carbon emissions, and most of its emissions come from deforestation".

The invaluable rainforests, with their enormous biodiversity. are the natural carbon sinks of the world. They are being destroyed to assuage the energy hunger of the humans. With the rapid destruction of the rain forests of the Amazon, the goal of sustainability recedes farther.Sustainable development is one which meets the needs of the present generation and at the same time, makes sure that the future generations' needs will be met. This means that the present generation desists from over-utilizing the resources like water, air, minerals and forests.

Rapidly developing economies of India and China , with their high density of population, will find the pressure on their natural resources very high. The developed countries are already using and wasting too much of the natural resources and contributing to global warming If we continue at this rate we will soon have a water crisis and a resources crunch to add to the food crisis.Sustainability can be achieved by the judicious mixture of population control, recycling and using less, and by careful husbanding of the earth's resources.

All the countries whether developed or under developed, must have a clear policy of population control. Everybody must voluntarily use less fuel, less water and less of every natural resource. Water and other natural resources must be managed so that it is not wasted. Recycling of water and other resources must become mandatory in all countries. Forests should be conserved and land under forest should be increased. Biodiversity of the planet should be conserved. This small blue planet is our home, as well as the home of millions of species of plants and animals.

We must do our best to conserve its resources ReferencesEhrlich ,Paul and Anne Ehrlich. Population Explosion New York, Simon and Schuster. 1990Grunwald, Michael.(2008,March 27) "The clean energy scam" Time Food prices pushed up by booming India : Bush (2008,May 4) The Sunday Hindustan Times. P. 17