How is the current development unsustainable?

According to the Brundtland Commission in 1987, the definition of sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. In 2012, James E. Hansen from NASA said “We're handing them [young people & future generations] a climate system which is potentially out of their control. We're in an emergency: you can see what's on the horizon over the next few decades with the effects it will have on ecosystems, sea level and species extinction.” Do you know that by 2025, 1.6 billion people will live in countries with absolute water scarcity. In my opinion, current development is unsustainable as a result of several reasons, such as deforestation and global warming.

  Deforestation is usually due to agriculture, logging and urbanization. Agriculture is the biggest reason of deforestation. To plant crops and graze livestock, farmers clear land by cutting down trees and burning them. There are an estimated 250 million slash-and-burn farmers across the world (Skegg, 2011). People also cut down trees for wood. According to The Timber Mafia, in 2000 the US imported over $450 million worth of timber from Indonesia. In 2005 the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) found that 13 million hectares of the world's forests are still lost each year. Another “trees killer” is urbanization, which leads to increase in areas occupied by the cities and forces the forests to recede as cities are expanding, there is not enough place.

Global warming leads rises of sea level and radiative forcing. According to the IPCC Fourth Assessment Synthesis Report (IPCC AR4 SYR, 2007), between the years 1961 and 2003, global average sea level rose at an average rate of 1.8 mm per year (mm/yr), with a range of 1.3–2.3 mm/yr. Also, between 1993 and 2003, the rate increased above the previous period to 3.1 mm/yr (range of 2.4–3.8 mm/yr). When there is a positive radiative forcing, the climate will tend to be warmed. Forster, P mentioned that anthopogenic forcing (i.e., the radiative forcing due to human activities) was estimated to have been positive due to the start of industrial era.

In conclusion, the current development is unsustainable in terms of losing too many trees and global warming. It is quite clear that if we do not take any measures to improve the situation, sooner or later the environment will not be hospitable for human beings any more.

References

Subsistence agriculture [hd] [Video]. (2011). Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dr1qxdwJwC8&feature=related

Facts and Figures. (n.d.). 4 corners. Retrieved from http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/content/2002/timber_mafia/resources/resources_facts.htm

Rhett, B. A. (2005, November 16). World deforestation rates and forest cover statistics. mongabay.com . Retrieved from http://news.mongabay.com/2005/1115-forests.html

What is Sustainable Development. (n.d.). The world bank group. Retrieved from http://www.worldbank.org/depweb/english/sd.html