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Effects of rapid population growth on the environment
The environmental impacts of food waste
The environmental impacts of food waste
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He got the sauce, no ketchup, just sauce. There're large amounts of food products just like ketchup that are wasted every day. With the amount of food produced, there are still many unfortunate people that starve when they could be fed with perfectly good food that some people throw away. In fact, food waste has become much more of a problem with large, growing populations and economies of different countries. About 9 billion people could be fed with the food that was wasted these past three years (Source B). In addition, more than 1 trillion dollars worth of food is wasted annually, which equates to 1.3 billion tons of food (Source C). People should be aware of this worldwide problem and take action to help reduce the amount of edible food being thrown out.When food gets thrown …show more content…
This amount of carbon dioxide could be detrimental to our society in that temperatures would rise, and cause harm to animal habitats. Because of the CO2 gas produced, it's negative effects are equivalent to setting fire to a rainforest by the amount of air pollution that is given off. Fortunately, reducing excess food waste would cause a great relief to Earth’s atmosphere and keep the air clean for plant and animal life. People are cutting down forests at a fast rate to produce more food for people (Source A). Trees are crucial to our oxygen and carbon dioxide exchange cycle. Without them, humans and all living species would become extinct without the presence of oxygen. This results in the decline of the Earth's environmental health and cause it to be uninhabitable, leaving a barren wasteland. It’s especially difficult on the environment with the high rate of population growth worldwide. On the other hand, by reducing food waste, we feed more people throughout the world and also save living species that are crucial for survival. Perfectly edible food gets wasted AND people lose hard earned money. Food is like money and instead of wasting it, it should be used efficiently and
The first step in achieving food security is to maximise the use of food already being produced and to minimise its waste. The FAO (2013) estimates that 1.3 billion tonnes
As Americans, we waste more food than many countries even consume. According to the Natural Resources Defense Council, “The average American trashes 10 times as much food as a consumer in South east Asia” (Hsu). That is about equivalent to eating 10 meals to a consumer in South East Asia’s one meal. We throw away our left over food just because we are done ea...
It is hard to believe that more than 49 million Americans don’t get enough to eat when there is data proving that we are producing more food than need it and at least half is going to waste. The lack of consistent access to enough
According to Roni Neff, Marie Spiker, and Patricia Truant, up to 40% of all food produced in America is thrown away (Neff, Spiker, & Truant, 2015, p.2). This wasted food is worth hundreds of billions of dollars that is lost each year in the United States alone, and creates many threats to our country. Food waste is an important and widespread issue in the United States because most of the food thrown away is perfectly fine, it could be used to feed the hungry, and the waste hurts the environment.
Imagine the tormenting waves of pain people suffer from after starving for days. Thus to end this universal suffering of our fellow human beings, I offer a proposal to end hunger. The hungry would do anything for even a morsel of the excessive amounts of food that most people carelessly discard. Imagine what we can do with the precious food that is wasted on a daily basis.
The book The No-Nonsense Guide to World Food, by Wayne Roberts introduces us to the concept of “food system”, which has been neglected by many people in today’s fast-changing and fast-developing global food scene. Roberts points out that rather than food system, more people tend to recognize food as a problem or an opportunity. And he believes that instead of considering food as a “problem”, we should think first and foremost about food as an “opportunity”.
Al Gore once said, “CO2 is the exhaling breath of our civilization,” this quote is completely accurate human civilization resolves around the production, consumption, use of entities that contain CO2. Due to our extreme use of CO2 based products we are causing a rapid spike in the CO2 levels in the atmosphere, the Mauna Loa CO2 records indicate CO2 levels has risen from 315ppm in 1960 to 403ppm in 2016 and it is still rising (noaa). This drastic increase of this toxic gas is that it is damaging the world, as we know it. The most talked about consequence of this is climate change, but the other “equally evil twin” is ocean acidification. This effect of this excessive amount of CO2 being released into our atmosphere is the decrease of pH levels of the oceans due to the increase uptake of CO2. The lowering pH level is due to the combination of CO2 and H2O combining and form carbonic acid, which is an acid. This acidification of the oceans is already wreaking havoc on the oceanic ecosystems and the effects will be more devastating in the
In order to bring about change in this misuse of food, Americans need to be conscious of the problem and their practices, the environmental effects, and ways they can reduce waste. In the first place, Americans need to be conscious of the problem and their practices. In her article, Eliana Dockterman states that the National Resources Defense Council has estimated that 40% of the food
Since the start of the Industrial Revolution, we have been using fossil fuels to power our lives, and factories. Little did we know that our miracle energy producer was destroying our planet. The burning of fossil fuels produces a byproduct called carbon dioxide. This natural occurring gas does not harm the planet in any way when released in small quantities, but at the rate we have released it, there is nowhere for it to go so it becomes trapped in the atmosphere. When the gas becomes trapped in the atmosphere, it creates a “Green House” effect. This effect causes the surface temperature to rise, which has adverse effects on the planet. A number of bills to regulate carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere have been proposed and even accepted,
Or if we don't do massive deforestation then CO2 wouldn't be a problem. We need to start to give some regard to our ecosystem by using less energy and start doing reforestation. Also, stopping coal and oil production without changing human behavior won't solve any problem, in truth it will lead us to a bigger problem, energy crisis. Some environmentalist advocate complete alteration into green energy to provide world energy, but this is impossible, well at least not in the near future. Even Dan Clark agree with this.
“Why is Processed Food So Bad for You?” by Michael Hobbes is an informative article discussing the negative aspects of processed foods. In the article, the author talks about his famous homemade marinara sauce. He goes on to talk about how his sauce could never make it in the processed food world because of the standardization, preservatives, thickeners, and emulsifiers. All processed foods have to be standardized so that every jar, box, and package taste exactly the same. Preservatives are added so that the foods can last on the shelves and not go bad by the time the consumer reaches them. Finally, thickeners and emulsifiers are added to give the product the right consistency. By the time all of these things are added, Hobbes’ sauce will taste nothing like it did originally. Processed foods are very unhealthy and are made this way to keep up with competitors.
Humans and animals breathe out Carbon Dioxide, often referred to as the greenhouse gas, as a waste product. Plants take in this CO2 and use it to make food. This is called photosynthesis. During this process oxygen is released which is then breathed in by humans and animals. This procedure is repeated over and over and a natural balance is obtained. However this natural balance is disrupted by human activity. People of the world are putting more than 5.5 billion tons of CO2 into the atmosphere every year. 75% of this is caused from the burning of fossil fuels. These fuels are burnt all the time to run factories, power plants and vehicles. The main sources of CO2 emissions are electric utilities, residential buildings, industry and transportation. The other 25% is induced by the destruction of the world's forests. The reason for this is that there are less trees and plants to take in the CO2 but there is just as many, if not more, humans and animals to breathe it out.
Food waste is the biggest space consumer in our landfills, which may seem surprising, but shouldn’t be based on the amount of food that is consumed on a daily basis and the large proportion of food that is wasted. The main problem with the amount of food waste in landfills, is that it produces methane as it decomposes which is detrimental to the atmosphere as a whole, and can have lasting effects. The buildup of all the methane produced results in huge amounts of global warming potential which is extremely detrimental to our environment. Also, because of the fact that so many resources are used in order to grow certain foods, they are all being put to waste when the food that used these resources goes directly to landfills. This applies to water usage, soil richness, and petroleum usage. As far as costs go, food waste affects the economy by about $750 billion a year, which is a massive amount of money that could be going elsewhere. Because we are losing so much money, it is clear that there is a great need for change in the food system, especially in the United
...veryday foods require a lot of energy and release a lot of greenhouse gases to produce. This is the reason we should stop wasting the foods, consume less meat, and eat more locally grown food.
According to Price et al. (1985), estimated values of the total global food loss and waste to around one third of the edible parts of food produced for human consumption, amounting to about 1.3 billion tonnes (1.28×109 long tons; 1.43×109 short tons) per year . In developing countries, like Ethiopia it is estimated that 400-500 calories per day per person are gainful