Section 2 Changing Population Trends
What do populations that have high rates of growth create?
Environmental problems, use resources at an increased rate and overwhelm infrastructure
What are infrastructure and give examples?
Basic facilities and services that support a community - public water suplies, sewer lines, power plants, roads, subways, schools, hospitals
What are the symptoms of overwhelming population growth?
Suburban sprawl, overcrowded schools, polluted rivers, barren land, inadequate housing
Problems of Rapid Growth
What can people not live without?
Sources of clean water, burnable fuel, land that can be farmed to produce food
When do standards of living decline?
When wood is removed from local forests faster than it regows or when wastes overwhelm local water sources
What are the resources most critically affected by rapid growth?
Vegetation, water, and land
In 2000, how much land would each person in the world get?
About 7.3 acres
In 2050 how much would they get?
4.8 acres
A Shortage of Fuel Wood
In poorest countries what is the main source of fuel?
Wood
How is wood for fuel important?
Can boil water and cook food - sterilized by boiling - food not cooked is often unsafe or hard to digest - without fuel wood many people suffer from disease and malnutrition
Unsafe Water
In places lacking infrastructure what may the water supply be used for?
Drinking and washing and sewage disposal
What is the result of these uses?
Water becomes breeding ground for organisms that cause diseases such as dysentary, typhoid, and cholera
How many people lack safe drinking water?
Over 1 billion
How many people died from diseases that were spread through water?
3 million
What happened in Peru in 1991?
First epidemic of cholera in western hemisphere in 75 years
Impacts on land
Where do people prefer to live?
Where they have easy access to resources and a comfortable lifestyle
What is arable land?
Land that can be used to grow crops
What is urbanization?
More people living in cities than in rural areas
What does suburban sprawl lead to?
Traffic jams, inadequate infrastructure, and reduction of land for farms, ranches, and wildlife habitat, housing within cities becomes more costly, more dense, and in shorter supply
A Demographically Diverse World
What terms do demographers prefer to use and why when describing countries?
More developed, less developed - complex and politically sensitive
What are least developed countries?
Countries that show signs of development and in some cases have increasing death rates while birth rates remain high
Where is most of the world’s population?
Asia
Managing Development and Population Growth
What will continued population growth prevent in less developed countries?
Imitating the development of the world's economic leaders
What countries have created campaigns to reduce fertility rates?
China, Thailand, and India
What do these campaigns include?
Public advertising, family planning campaigns, economic incentives or legal punishments
Growth is Slowing
What is the human population size now?
Over 6 billion
What has happened to fertility rates since 1970?
Declined in both more and less developed regions - rates much higher in less developed countries
What could possibly happen by 2050?
Most countries will have replacement level fertility rates and population growth would eventually stop
Projections to 2050
What will the world’s population be in 2050?
9 billion
