The Myth of Overpopulation

Overpopulation is a relative term, usually related to such factors as food, resources, and living space, according to Dr. David Osterfeld, professor of Political Science at Saint Joseph's College in Rensselaer, Indiana. He notes, "Food production has outpaced population growth, on average, one percent per year ever since global food data began being collected in the late 1940s."
Many experts believe "that even with no advances in science or technology we currently have the capacity to feed adequately, on a sustainable basis, 40 to 50 billion people, or about eight to ten times the current world population." Where people are hungry, he points out, "it is because of war (Somalia, Ethiopia) or government policies that...penalize farmers by taxing them at prohibitive rates (e.g., Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya), not because population is exceeding the natural limits of what the world can support."

Resources, too, "have become more abundant over time. Practically all resources, including energy, are cheaper now than ever before. Relative to wages, natural resource prices in the United States in 1990 were only one-half what they were in 1950, and just one-fifth their price in 1900. Prices outside the United States show similar trends."

And when it comes to living space, "if the entire population of the world were placed in the state of Alaska, every individual would receive nearly 3,500 square feet of space, or about one-half the size of the average American family homestead with front and back yards" . Planet-wide, less than "one-half of one percent of the world's ice-free land area is used for human settlements," and there are now "more houses, ore floor space, and more rooms per person than ever before."

"In short," Dr. Osterfeld concludes, "although there are now more people in the world than ever before, by any meaningful measure the world is actually becoming relatively less populated".
-from New American, 12/13/93)