Sunday, March 22, 1998

How dense can we get? The population figures show

By Werner Fornos

As world population soars towards six billion, available land in rural areas is overplowed and overpumped. For many people in developing countries, the countryside offers only hardships brought on by high fertility rates, environmental degradation and diminishing resources.

These problems are not confined to the developing world. Population growth and migration within the United States have caused dramatic changes in western states such as Texas. These areas will face serious challenges of balancing population and economic growth with environmental sustainability. But Texas is better equipped to handle these pressures than many developing countries.

Some of the world's cities are growing so large, due primarily to high fertility rates and rural-to-urban migration, that a new urban category has been designated for them. Cities with populations over eight million are now called "megacities." The most crowded megacities are expected to have populations between 18 and 27 million by 2015.

Of crucial concern are the 27 megacities located in developing countries already struggling to provide their populations with the most basic services. High fertility rates account for two-thirds of the population growth of developing world cities. Only one-third is a result of rural to urban migration as people abandon the countryside seeking economic opportunity in the city.

As residents of one of the fastest growing states, Texans understand some of the stresses population growth can have on the environment and living conditions. In north Texas, the gradual loss of the Ogallala aquifer is a textbook example of an imbalance between population and resources.

Urban leaders around the world have learned hard lessons about the stress a large city can put on the environment. Without sanitation systems and pollution controls, cities spew pollutants into the air and water, leading to health problems among people near and far, and harming the environment as well. Currently, 2.6 billion people worldwide do not have adequate sanitation.

In addition, forests are being transformed by urban expansion and by people seeking the resources they need for survival. Forests provide 70 percent of developing world families with their only source of fuel. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations reports the loss of continuous forest coverage is occurring most rapidly in Brazil and Asia, where eight of the top 10 megacities will be located by 2015.

Unsustainable population increases in the developing world place tremendous pressures on countries like the United States that face a steady influx of immigrants, both legal and illegal, searching for a better life. Texas has been subjected to these pressures as a result of its long border with Mexico.

Texas is the third (after California and New York) most popular destination for immigrants annually. Despite its sheer enormity, the state of Texas is becoming more densely populated, with its population per square mile increasing from 36.4 people in 1960 to 64.9 in 1990 and 71.2 in 1996.

Texas may not be in danger of running out of space, but its increasing population will severely drain some of the state's natural resources, such as the Ogallala aquifer.

Many world leaders acknowledge the need for universal access to voluntary family planning information, education and services. In fact, 82 countries have stated in official government positions that their birth rates are too high. According to the World Fertility Survey, 400 million women did not want their last child, wanted more spacing between their children or do not want another child, yet lack access to family planning information, education and services.

On this small planet, we all must share natural resources such as water, air, fuel and food and realize we are susceptible to the same infectious diseases. As citizens of the world, the problems of overpopulated megacities in seeingly faraway places are also our own.

Werner Fornos is president of the Population Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit organization seeking a more equitable balance between the world's population, environment and resources. He was in Abilene recently speaking to Rotarians.