The History Book

339

global challenge to improve living

standards without destroying the

environment. Scientists believe

that human activity is to blame

for climate change (or “global

warming”). Since the Industrial

Revolution in the 19th century,

global temperatures have continued

to rise, with 2011–15 the warmest

five-year period on record.

Some of the reasons behind

climate change are due to natural

occurrences, but in the early 1970s

the rise of environmentalism raised

public doubts about the benefits

to the planet of human activity.

Developing nations were being

urged to reduce carbon emissions,

which are thought to effect climate

change. In 2015, India was opening

a mine a month to lift its 1.3 billion

citizens out of poverty rapidly.

Developed countries, which had

themselves contributed to climate

change, caused a new tension by

suggesting that developing nations

should cease exploiting their own

natural resources to improve the

economic well-being of their people.

Scientists warned that humans

would pass the threshold beyond

which climate change becomes

catastrophic and irreversible if

greenhouse-gas emissions kept

increasing. Sea levels are also

rising, eroding coastal areas and

obliterating small islands in the

South Pacific. Rainfall patterns are

changing, leading to severe drought

in Africa, and many species of

animals are in danger of extinction.

The threat of climate change is

now considered so serious that

leaders from around the world met

in 2015 in Paris, France, at a

conference to agree to reduce the

build-up of greenhouse gases. In

fraught negotiations, developing

countries demanded that wealthier

nations help pay for them to adapt

to the effects of climate change,

such as increased floods and

droughts. In all, 196 nations

adopted the first ever universal,

legally binding, global climate deal,

limiting global warming to the

relatively safe level of 3.6°F (2°C).

A hungry world

In the 1970s, ecology movements

predicted that hundreds of millions

would die from mass starvation by

THE MODERN WORLD

the mid-1980s. This dire prediction

did not come to pass, but with an

astonishing 7 billion humans on the

planet, there is an inevitable drain

on natural resources. Overfishing,

particularly in Indonesia and China,

has led to fish stocks around the

world falling rapidly, and the

demand for water could soon

outstrip supply. In 2015, the UN

predicted that 1.8 billion people will

be living in countries or regions

with absolute water scarcity by

2025. Coal, which drives industry
      and production, is in increasing
      demand but will eventually run out.
      The UN estimates that by 2050
      the global population will be at 9.7
      billion, and that by 2100, 11.2 billion
      people will inhabit the Earth.
      Population dynamics are changing
      from high mortality and high
      fertility to low mortality and low
      fertility, with an increasingly elderly
      population worldwide, which will
      be difficult to support. Challenges
      such as climate change, migration
      and refugee crises, food and water
      insecurity, poverty, debt, and
      disease are greatly exacerbated by
      rapid population growth. Stabilizing
      the growth of the world’s population
      may be the key to global survival. ■

We are not going

to be able to

burn it all.

Barack Obama

On fossil fuels

The severe air pollution caused

by power plants in developing nations

is having an enormously detrimental

effect on the health of those people

who live nearby.

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