Sustanaibility Paper
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Production and consumption are two complementary activities that human beings perform daily. Most of the times, these activities require the destruction of our ecosystem because they lead to the deforestation, the air and water pollution, and extinction of species. Because the production and consumption habits of human being have direct effect on the ecosystem, it must be said that human health, animals, and plants are in danger. This paper will assess some specific examples of production and consumption habits that are related to material resources. It will also discuss efforts that must be considered about these production and consumption habits in order to sustain the global population.
Talking about production and consumption I would like to give the example of Nigeria where people shepherd cow (production) for meat or milk (production). Given that the population there increases every year like in any other countries around the world, it is obvious that the demand of such food increases as well. History reveals that farmers did not settle on poor soils where water was dangerous (Turk & Bensel, 2011). They rather settled in rich valleys. The purpose of this settlement was to produce goods that are necessary for consumption. Later, human beings became smart by inventing the way of producing food. They started destroying forests and natural environment in order to make rooms for the development and expansion. The increase of the population automatically led to the need to looking for more space for development and expansion. This trend will continue throughout history. Human population has greatly increased. Therefore, there was need to find space to build houses and to farm. This required cutting down trees which in turn will lead to what is called deforestation. This phenomenon continues till today. That is why the Earth Summit of 1997 raised the following question: “If we continue “business as usual”, will we be able to meet the needs of a growing global population–in the immediate future and for generations to come?” (Earth Summit, 1997, Para. 3).
The production habit which is to farm or build houses and roads has tremendously impacted the environment we live in. Lack of green space and global warming are some of the examples of the impacts of the human production habit on the environment. But there is more to this issue. The industrialization of most of the cities around the world creates the pollution of the environment. It is important to develop the cities. It is important to invent and introduce new technologies to meet our needs. But all this leads to damaging our environment. Since the effluents from the industries are not treated before they flow into the water that causes the pollution of the water. The sulfur dioxide and nitrogen dioxide that are released into the atmosphere produce acid rains which cause the acidification of the crops, dangerous to human and animal consummation. The chlorofluorocarbons released from the industries also destroy the ozone layer which passes dangerous rays to the atmosphere. As noted by Slaterry (2007) the result of this is skin cancer and other diseases.
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