THE IMPACTS OF POPULATION GROWTH ON FOOD CONSUMPTION, INCOME PER CAPITA GROWTH, AND SUSTAINABILITY

The world’s population has already exceeded 7 billion and is expected to grow to above 9 billion by 2045 (Albrectsen, 2013). Most of the developing countries are experiencing high population growth while immigration patterns are being experienced on a global perspective as well as demographic transitions in the developed countries including higher number of aged population and decline in population (Couwenberg, 2008). These population dynamics come with significant effects on the economic growth, food security and the global efforts towards sustainability.

In terms of food consumption, population growth results into increased demand for food supplies. Food production is highly determined by the availability of land and water. However, with the environmental and climate changes, economic growth and development as well as rapid population increase, these two resources are under high pressure and therefore hindering the production of enough food supply to be consumed by the increasing population (Torrey and Preston, 1993). The environmental program calls for more lands to be put under forestry to curb the climate changes. This means that there is no available land resource to equate the demand for the food consumption.

 In terms of income per capita growth, the growth in population results into a negative impact since there are increased number of people thus a reduction of the money that can be earned from a very populated region (Schneider et al., 2011). In cases of high population increase, there is low investment which results into low capital output ratios. The means that the available resources cannot be effectively invested upon to produce the desirable capita outputs.

The rate of growth of population also determines the sustainability projects laid upon by the organization. The world has been laying down policies and strategic goals that are aimed at achieving a sustainable development in the world. Increase in population makes it difficult for these goals to be achieved since a high population leads to more exploitation of the resources thus making it difficult and almost impossible to implement the sustainable development policies (Albrectsen, 2013). This is observed in cases of urbanization and industrialization, traffic congestions, air pollution, unsustainable energy production methods and food shortage. These factors demonstrates how rapid population growth results into negative implications on the global and regional sustainability efforts.

References

Albrectsen, A. (2013). Sustainable Development and Population Dynamics: Placing People at the Centre.

Couwenberg, W. (2008). Sustainability and population growth as a global problem – Stichting de Club van Tien Miljoen. [online] Overpopulationawareness.org. Available at: http://www.overpopulationawareness.org/en/articles/sustainability-and-population-growth-as-a-global-problem  [Accessed 7 Oct. 2017].

Schneider, U., Havlík, P., Schmid, E., Valin, H., Mosnier, A., Obersteiner, M., Böttcher, H., Skalský, R., Balkovič, J., Sauer, T. and Fritz, S. (2011). Impacts of population growth, economic development, and technical change on global food production and consumption. Agricultural Systems, 104(2), pp.204-215.

Torrey, B. and Preston, S. (1993). Population Growth, Environmental Change, and Innovation: Implications for Sustainable Growth in Agriculture. In: B. Torrey and S. Preston, ed., Population and Land Use in Developing Countries: Report of a Workshop. [online] National Academies Press, pp.124-156. Available at: https://www.nap.edu/read/2211/chapter/10  [Accessed 7 Oct. 2017].