The greatest obstacle for many farmers and producers in dealing with increasing food production for the growing human population is avoiding environmental problems. We know cities will get bigger and suburbs will grow greater across the United States over the next few decades and by 2050 the population increase will likely be 2.6 billion more people to feed. We need to look at different ways to produce food that will sharply decrease the harmful environmental effect in areas such as biodiversity loss, topsoil erosion and air pollution.
Biodiversity is a variety of all living things in which they exist and interact within plant and animal species. The variety of life such as genetic variation, species variation, ecosystem variation or plant and animal species are essential to the health of our earth’s ecosystems. Without it, most life forms would not exist. Food and biofuel production systems have caused a great deal of losses of biodiversity. For instance, “natural biodiversity and ecological services are threatened when tropical and other forests are cleared and when grasslands are plowed up and replaced with cropland used to produce food and biofuel for cars.” (Miller & Spoolman, 2013, p. 216) Another problem faced is the increasing loss of the world’s variety of animal and plant species used to provide food. According to scientists, since 1900 we have lost approximately 75% of the genetic diversity of agriculture crops once available to farmers. We can assume that a small amount might be “kept in the seed banks, in the backyard of a few gardeners, and in non-profit organizations such as Seed Savers Exchange.” (Miller & Spoolman, 2013, p. 216) In reality, this suggests that we are quickly reducing the world’s genetic...
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...d organic vegetable farm that may grow forty or more different crops on one piece of land. Additionally, developing more sustainable agriculture helps retain more water in soil during drought years, uses about 30% less energy per unit yield, increases biodiversity above and below ground and lowers carbon dioxide emissions. (Miller & Spoolman, 2013, p. 231) The approach to organic farming has a number of environmental benefits and even farmers from less-developed countries can employ organic method for growing crops.
More farmers and producers are forced to focus on reducing its environmental impact as demand for increasing food production grows. The major advantages of growing food more sustainably helps with biodiversity, improves topsoil fertility, reduces topsoil erosion, shift from using less fossil fuels, and decrease in greenhouse gases to the atmosphere.
Long-term survival of a species depends on its ability to adapt to changing environmental conditions (Murphy, 1994). Genetic diversity within a species, which has taken 3.5 billion years to evolve, makes adaptations to these changing environments possible. Unfortunately, the rate of extinction of genetically diverse organisms is rapidly increasing, thus reducing this needed biodiversity, largely due to the human impacts of development and expansion. What was an average of one extinction per year before is now one extinction per hour and extinct species numbers are expected to reach approximately one million by the year 2000 (WWW site, Bio 65). As a result governmental and societal action must be taken immediately!
In The Diversity of Life, Edward O. Wilson reflects on how the living world became diverse and how humans are destroying that diversity. In the book’s preface, Wilson defines biodiversity as “the totality of inherited variation in all organisms in a selected area” (Wilson ix). He adds that modern technology will allow for us to find many new species that were previously unknown to be in existence.
My starting point for this paper was the movie Food Inc. directed by Robert Kenner. Although the film’s main purpose was to expose how detrimental today’s food industry is to our health, at the same time I found myself wondering how the food industry and our diets affect the environment. The film mentions how the meat industry takes heavy tolls on the environment because of the land that must be devoted in order to raise livestock—both to grow the food for the animals to eat and to provide a place for the animals to reside. The film also mentions how there are only 4 or 5 major crops that are grown in America—including corn, wheat, and soybean, which are used a lot for animal feed—which decreases America’s biodiversity (Food). All of these things led me to pursue the question: how does our consumption of animal products affect the environment?
By 2012, United States ranked first in obesity rate among all developed countries(The World Post). According to Gallup research, the graph of obesity rate tells us that "The adult obesity rate so far in 2013 is 27.2%, up from 26.2%"(Sharpe). Obesity is just one little sector of health issues caused by food production. Like obesity, many health issues are rising and increasing their victims from what we eat. How the food we eat makes us ill? To solve the health issues, we must look carefully at the ingredients and other sources that are included in the food we eat because they might be the causes of health issues.
In order for us to maintain our lives, we need to consume food to supply nutrient-needs for our bodies. As the global population increased, the demand for food also increased. Increased population led to mass production of foods. However, even with this mass production, in under-developed countries, people are still undernourished. On other hand, in developed and developing countries, people are overfed and suffering from obesity. In addition, the current methods of industrial farming destroy the environment. These problems raised a question to our global food system. Will it be able to sustain our increasing global population and the earth? With this question in my mind, I decided to investigate the sustainability of our current global food system.
Biodiversity is the variety of species in the world or in a particular area or habitat and their loss is prevalent all over the world. This has mainly taken place because of habitat loss that is caused by deforestation, overpopulation, pollution and global warming. It is important that we (humans) take part in an action to stop the habitat loss we are causing. Biodiversity, from sea to land, all play an important role in our ecosystem and without them, we would suffer.
Various plant and animal species depend on each other for what each offers and these diverse species ensures natural sustainability for all life forms. A healthy and solid biodiversity can recover itself from a variety of disasters. It is estimated that the current species extinction rate is between 1,000 and 10,000 times higher than it would naturally be. Therefore, there is an urgent need, not only to manage and conserve the biotic wealth, but also restore the degraded ecosystems. c) Captivity breeding species can again be reintroduced into the wild.
Vandermeer, J. & Perfecto, I. Breakfast of Biodiversity. The Institute for Food and Development Policy: Oakland, CA, 1995.
Some of the serious environmental tribulations related to food production and consumption consist of “climate change, water pollution, water scarcity, soil degradation, eutrophication of water bodies, and loss of habitats and biodiversity (Reisch L., 2014).” ... ... middle of paper ... ... Works Cited APHA. 2014, February 28.
Protect biodiversity by opposing the privatisation and manipulation of the plant and animal gene pool.
One of the reasons for loss in biodiversity is alteration of habitats. A habitat is the natural environment in which a species of living organism lives. If the habitat of a species is changed, it will cause the species to die or migrate to other places where it can find its natural habitat. There are many ways in which the habitat of plants and animals can be altered. One of them is land use changes. Since the beginning of human life, human beings have been changing land use for farming. Large areas of forests have been cleared by humans to increase the area of farming to satisfy their growing needs. Many biodiversity-rich landscape characteristics have been lost due to intensive farming (Young, Richards, Fischer, Halada, Kull, Kuzniar, Tartes, Uzunov & Watt, 2007). For example, traditional farming was replaced by private farms in Europe after the First World War causing an immense change in land use patterns. Another major proble...
The global population in the year 2050 is expected to be nine billion and the agricultural demand is expected to double. With the current population already over seven billion people, there are hunger issues all around the world (“New” par. 1). How are we going to deal with food shortages in the future? With less land to work with, strains on the soils, and the lack of water, it is getting harder for the farmers of the world to support our growing population. These complications are making it harder for farmers to produce quality, affordable food. To help the crops grow better, farmers use fertilizers and chemical sprays to enhance growth and control the weeds. Farming in the United States is a relevant business because it supplies people with food, provides people with jobs maintaining the used equipment with the new equipment being much more expensive, and it provides research for more efficient ways on how to feed the world.
The Earth is far and away the most biodiverse planet in our solar system, with about 8.7 million more unique species than the other 8 planets (UNEP). However, the Earth’s commanding lead is shrinking; not because the other planets are increasing biodiversity, but because Earth’s is decreasing. According to the World Wildlife Fund, we as a planet are losing 1,000 to 10,000 more species than the natural rate. Since the total number of species is hard to pin down, this can mean anywhere from 200 to 10,000 species going extinct per year (World Wildlife Fund). This obscenely high extinction rate is dangerous not just to ecosystems directly affected by the loss, but also creates a domino effect that circles around the globe and up and down the food
...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.
NEED AND PURPOSE FOR CONSERVATION OF BIODIVERSITY: Biodiversity, a contraction of “biological diversity,” generally refers to the variety and variability of life on Earth. The very existence of human species and sustainable development depend on biodiversity conservation, therefore the need for conservation of biodiversity is basically for this reason that all living creatures need other creatures and plants in one way or the other. At least 40 per cent of the world’s economy and 80 per cent of the needs of the poor are mainly derived from biological resources. Biodiversity is necessary for our existence as well as valuable in its own right as it provides the fundamental building blocks for the many goods and services which are essential