China is known for its farming culture which supplies daily necessities such as, rice, potatoes, tea, poultry, etc. Harvesting wheat in the morning and planting other crops in the evening, 300 million farmers commit to the seemingly endless work to feed the 1.3 billion in China and ~22% of the world's population, making it a vital industry. (Ivanova, 2013) As the saying goes, “Everything comes with a price” Behind all these lays the hidden ugly, dirty truth of China’s agriculture: contaminated freshwater resources. With half of China's population lacking safe drinking water, nearly ⅔ of China's rural population (s pollution is greater and an underlying reason for the difference is the agricultural practices used: Industrial vs Organic. Case studies such as China and India have been used to illustrate my stand.
Food insecurity has gained so much ground in recent times because of the global population growth. Factors such as; rising prices, drought and other climate disasters, arable land shortages, and increasing demand threatens the availability of food. The world’s population projected to reach 9.6 billion in 2050. Africa’s population is projected to increase by 1.3 billion people by the middle of this century despite the ravages of hunger, disease, and civil conflict. Therefore in other to keep up with the rising demand of the growing population (not to improve the current situation), food production must increase by 70 percent by 2050 according to FAO.
The high demand for more farmland helps drive the need to cut down more trees, which in turn, contributes to deforestation. Tropical forests have the highest impact rate when it comes to deforestation due to agriculture. In the tropics, only the topsoil is highly fertile, so when the nutrient-rich soil is gone, people cut down more trees to find more fertile topsoil. Tropical forests lose thousands of acres daily due to agricultural use. One way people take out trees for agriculture us is a process called “slash and burn”.
It is likely that the use of groundwater for irrigation purpose will even increase with time due to the increase in population density and its demand for food security, negative impact of climate change on surface water bodies, increase in technology in farming, it closeness to the point of need, etc. The global statistics for groundwater irrigation in Table 2.2 also confirms this observation. For example, in India the groundwater-irrigated area increased by 500% since 1960 as they extract 160 kilometers of groundwater a year for irrigation (Shah, 2009; UNESCO 2004). About half of the vegetable producers in Ghana use groundwater for irrigation especially in the dry season (Cornish and Aidoo, 2000) and farmers in the Keta and the surrounding
This can happen either naturally or by human actions. According to Environmental Protection Agency, “The historical record shows that the climate system varies naturally over a wide range of time scales. In general, climate changes prior to the Industrial Revolution in the 1700s can be explained by natural causes, such as changes in solar energy, volcanic eruptions, and natural changes in greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations” (EPA, 2009). The following graph shows the “estimates of the earth’s changing carbon dioxide”, and we can see the historical analysis of 800,000 years (EPA, 2009). As we can see, the CO2 concentration is varying from 180-300 parts per million.
And, the persistent of monoculture eventually leads to the loss of biodiversity. “A case can be made that the corn plant’s population explosion on places like Iowa us responsible for pushing out not only other plants but the animals and finally the people, too”(Pollan 38). The economic temptation encourages the practice of monoculture instead of running a diverse farm. Species are forced to leave and clear the land for corn plantation. However, biodiversity is vital for sustainable development because every livestock and crops are completing the food chain.
Some of it is trapped by a number of gases which resulting in the Greenhouse Effect. Global warming is the increase in average temperature of Earth due to the effect of Greenhouse gases. Greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, hydrocarbons. In 1896 Arrhenius was the first to claim that fossil fuel combustion may at some later time result in enhanced Global Warming.The observed rise in temperature over the 20th century was 0.3 to 0.6˚C. In 2014- IPCC release new report on Climate change, this report says that human activities are the dominant (95%) cause of the climate change.
Abstract The growing human population will definitely increase demand for food and fibre to feed an additional 2 billion people by 2050. Several gains that were made in the 1970s through the use of high yielding varieties and high-tech technologies are being reversed because there is evidence of soil degradation and destruction of natural resources especially in Africa and parts of Asia. The most notable challenges affecting agricultural productivity include; climate change, decline in soil and water quality, reduction of farmer participation in conservation practices and uneven policies that do not ensure sustainability. Sustainable agriculture means that it should cover all the five aspects of sustainability; biological productivity, economic
“Today humanity uses the equivalent of 1.6 Earths to provide the resources we use and absorb our waste. This means it now takes the Earth one year and six months to regenerate what we use in a year” (“Ecological Footprint”). For example, the use of fossil fuels for energy (to drive cars, heat and cool houses) has an impact on global CO2 levels and resulting environmental effects. Thus, this impact has resulted in a new term to describe our time: the Anthropocene epoch (Dovers and Butler). Scientists characterized this epoch by the dominant influence that humans’ activities are having on the environment, positioning humans as a new global geophysical
Introduction: Throughout our history as human beings living on this planet we have, right throughout our history, exploited the planet’s natural resources where possible for the benefit of ourselves. Unfortunately, it is often the case that through our exploitation of the Earth’s resources we can leave a permanent trail of destruction behind us. The process that I will examine is the process of deforestation which can be defined as the clearing of forestlands for agriculture and other land-uses such as settlements, mining and other infrastructure, FAO (2010). People have carried out deforestation for centuries in order to use both the wood for building and burning etc. as well clearing the landscape for the purpose of agriculture.