Population
"Population - Mr Rudd – When do we stop?"
The quotes in the teaser were from a press release by Bob Brown on 18 September 2009.
Ed. The Speech below was made yesterday. Unfortunately, the Greens are having problems with a small, noisy, nasty minority - in Victoria at least (and rumour has it that pressure comes from South Australia) - which is preventing the majority from placing restrictions on numbers of immigrants. This minority has infiltrated all political movements and knows how to frighten people into shutting up. However, they should not be frightened, because they will have the support of the majority of good people.
From Matters of Public Importance speech Senator Brown made yesterday (28 Oct 09):
In the last few days we have had the Prime Minister talking up the prospect of an Australia in which 35 million people live. We are at 23 million now. We were some seven million when I arrived on the planet. You would not remember that, Madam Acting Deputy President Carol Brown! But we have to ask the logical question of Prime Minister Rudd: ‘Name the final point. What is the ultimate carrying capacity of Australia if you say that growth is dependent on population increase ad infinitum?’ The logic of that is that there is no end point, that we not only continue to cram people into this giant country with very limited carrying capacity but we continue to cram our fellow human beings, all of whom aspire to life and happiness as much as we do, onto a planet which cannot bear it.
I will read from the National Geographic’s EarthPulse: State of the Earth 2010 document, which says it is a collectors’ edition—and I wonder if that says something about the future as well. It says:
Scientists and policymakers have warned that environmental degradation and global climate change could cause massive displacement of populations some day. For millions of our fellow humans, driven from their homes by melting permafrost, increased coastal flooding, or desertification of once arable land, that day has arrived.
Hard numbers are elusive, but an estimated 25 million people are environmental “refugees” (officially, that word is reserved for those fleeing armed conflict). By 2050, that number could jump to 200 million. Climate change is projected to increase aridity in already dry areas, and to spur more extreme rainfall and flooding events such as one that displaced more than two million people in the Indian state of Bihar in 2008. Perhaps most alarming, even modest sea-level rise will wash away the homes and fertile fields of millions more.
On the next page, it goes to ‘Forced Migration, Hotspots of Global Change, Bangladesh’. There is a picture of three women up to the top of their shoulders in water. The woman at the front has a floating metal vessel in front of her. Obviously they are appealing to the photographer and whoever is behind the photographer for some form of sustenance in a neighbourhood where, if you are going to stay there, you will be up to your shoulders in water because of the flood. It says this about Bangladesh:
Low-lying Bangladesh foretells the future of climate refugees. Because roughly half of the country lies less than ten meters (33 ft) above sea level, it has been flooded more frequently as glacial melt in the Himalaya has risen. Tropical cyclone activity is also likely to rise in the near future, swelling the Padma (Ganges), Jamuna (Brahmaputra), and Meghna Rivers, which all lie within the country’s borders. Climate refugees already account for more than a third of recent migrants to Dhaka, the capital. Nearly 80 per cent of the nation’s legal disputes are over land erosion triggered by storms.
I watched on television just the other night as people hastily pulled down their corrugated iron shelters in Bangladesh as the banks collapsed on a river and eroded 100 metres across the fields upon which the people depended, to swallow their houses. The people hastily collapsed their houses to at least take away the building materials.
We are in a world that is in very great human-induced trouble. «Population» is part of that. When I came onto the planet, in 1944, there were 2.5 billion people. There are now 6.8 billion people, a tripling almost. By mid-century, when youngsters now will be in their middle age, it is projected there will be nine billion to 11 billion people—more likely 11 billion if you read this National Geographic special, which is currently on the bookshelves. Add this to that. At the front of the book it says:
Together we consume 1.4 Earths’ worth of resources per year.
In other words, we are burrowing away at the bounty which we need to survive. We will need 3.1 more planets if we are all to survive by mid-century on the average British level of consumption, which is below ours. That cannot happen, and we have to have the wit and wisdom to find a way to share better, to work with each other, to reduce consumption and to reduce «population growth. I hope the Prime Minister has got a lot of thinking occurring on that, because Australia is charged with being a leader, not at the back, when it comes to dealing with the issue of how we human beings are going to live peaceably with the planet instead of off it.
Comments
Milly (not verified)
Thu, 2009-10-29 17:02
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Australia won't be able to help feed the hungry world!
Vivienne (not verified)
Tue, 2009-11-10 09:15
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Population poll today in The Age
Tigerquoll
Tue, 2009-11-10 13:05
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Pop Stats need to be relative to have meaning to mainstream
The population statistics have little meaning to the mainstream population when expressed as a national aggregate. A figure of 35 million or 50 million for the whole of Australia may sound small or large. This is reflected in the contradictory results of The Age/Nielson poll.
It is important to first appreciate the inherent weaknesses of statistics and of survey sampling of quantitative data.
Australia’s population size has a comparable meaning as world population being about 6.7 Billion. The mainstream will ask, so how does that impact on me? How do people evaluate whether a figure is acceptable or too large?
Well, when that figure is expressed as a relative change or is translated to the scale of the person being surveyed. For instance, If Australia’s population in November 2009 is about 22 million, then 50 million represents a doubling of the current figure. In order to objectively guage public opinion about projected population growth and immigration, the Age/Nielson poll ought to ask is: Is the doubling of Australia’s population from what it is now to what it may be in forty years time an acceptable level of population growth? This allows the respondent to a survey assess the figure relative to what they know now. It is important to be aware that population growth and immigration, while related, are different statistics.
Further, the national figure should be translated into a likely proportion on a State basis (which in Australia would in the main be the same as the Capital City of that State. For instance, NSW (or Sydney) may typically have a third the population of Australia (see ABS statistics below). So another survey question could ask: Is an increase of Sydney’s population by 13 million (1/3 of 40 million) an acceptable level of population growth?
MARCH KEY FIGURES
Population at end Mar qtr 2009
PRELIMINARY DATA '000
________________________________________
New South Wales 7 076.5
Victoria 5 402.6
Queensland 4 380.4
South Australia 1 618.2
Western Australia 2 224.3
Tasmania 501.8
Northern Territory 223.1
Australian Capital Territory 349.9
Australia(a) 21 779.1
________________________________________
(a) Includes Other Territories comprising Jervis Bay Territory, Christmas Island and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands.
SOURCE: Australian Bureau of Statistics
Yes, we must question the validity of the poll – the collection, analysis and interpretation of the population data. The statistical method used by Age/Neilson should be independently peer scrutinised, to ensure best practice is followed and so the public and federal policy makers alike are not mislead with inappropriate findings. “Statistics is the science of making effective use of numerical data relating to groups of individuals or experiments. It deals with all aspects of this, including not only the collection, analysis and interpretation of such data, but also the planning of the collection of data, in terms of the design of surveys and experiments.”
[SOURCE: Wikipedia citing Dodge, Y. (2003) The Oxford Dictionary of Statistical Terms, OUP]
I question whether in this poll whether indeed effective use has been made of the numerical data.
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