Population, Family Planning,
& Ecology News Digest
Archives 1998
Dec 22 1998 BBC
Appeal for Birth Control in Pakistan.
Religious-based parties should understand that
Islam is not against family planning.
Dec 1998
Substandard Condoms Dumped in Africa New York Times 100s of millions handed out free. 48 out of 200 in test batches broke
Dec 31 1998 ENN
Landscape changes may alter climate
A University of
Wisconsin-Madison computer-driven model showed that continued deforestation of the Amazon, combined with increased carbon dioxide
levels, would reduce annual rainfall . This concept also applies to the transformation of North American prairies to farmland.
Evapotranspiration, where rain is recycled back to the atmosphere through trees and forest plants, is essential to a landscape's ability to cool itself.
Plus forests and prairies can store carbon dioxide much better than cornfields or pasture.
Dec 31 1998
U.S. Population Grows 1 percent July 1 1997 - July 1 1998
Highest growing states Nevada (4.1%), Arizona (2.5 %), Georgia, Colorado and Texas.
From the US Census Bureau
Dec 31 1998
Zambia's Population Project Obtains UNFPA support.
Finance Secretary Nonde: "All people have the basic right to information so as to decide freely
and responsibly the number and spacing of their children".
Dec 31 1998
China Tackles Pollution in Taihu Lake
Dec 30 1998
Family Planning is Working, but World Population Still Growing From the Population Institute.
A dozen of the poorest nations are still expected to triple their populations by mid-century, according to the Population Institute. 97 percent of the increase occurred in poor nations already burdened with
economic, environmental, public health and other problems; 58 countries have fertility rates of five
or more children per woman.
Dec 28 1999 New York Times
Sea Otter Decline along California's Central Coast. Pollution and disease suspected.
Dec 28 1998
Fragile Sea Horse Threatened by Overfishing Prized for their use in Chinese medicine and the
aquarium trade, 70 percent have been lost over the last ten years.
Dec 28 1998
China's Natural Conservation Land up to Average World Level. Now up to 7.64 percent. To add 100 reserves every year for several years.
Dec 28 1998
Tool aids forest carbon storage studies
Dec 28 1998
Malaria Spreading Quickly in Sub-Saharan Africa
- a result of deforestation, global warming, creation of dams, irrigation
schemes and commercial tree cropping, according to the World
Health Organization.
Dec 26 1998
Mozambican Capital's Population Grows by 79% since 1980
Dec 26 1998
China: Local Governments Blamed for Grave Soil Erosion. 38.2 percent of the national land mass involved in serious erosion
Dec 25 1998
China: Gauze Masks Help People of Lanzhou Deal with Air Pollution. The main pollutants are dust and sulphur dioxide.
Fast economic growth and the use of coal for heating have caused further air quality deterioration.
Dec 25 1998
Bangladesh: Air Pollution in Dhaka Reaches High Level. 160,000 motorized vehicles operate in the metropolitan area,
with about 1/3 of them having no fitness certificates, emitting black smoke and fumes.
Dec 24 1998
Hunting, Fishing Groups Seek to Ban Big Livestock Farms - Blamed for manure spills that have polluted
streams, rivers and ground water in more than 30 states.
Dec 24 1998
Pollution in Vietnam Becomes More Serious: Carbon dioxide and nitric oxide due to vehicles, dust, and solid waste.
Dec 23 1998
Global Warming Can Destabilize an Ecosystem Colorado -
gives invading plants an advantage over native plant life.
Dec 22 1998
Mexico City Smog Forces Third Day of Emergency
Dec 22 1998
Should Ethiopia Suffer the Present Level of Environmental Degradation? "Since most of our rivers eventually end up in foreign lands, our biggest export is
fertile soil. A positive balance of commodity exchange minus the dollars." "The more people you
have in a community, the more trees will have to be cut down to satisfy the needs of the
people for wood for fuel and construction."
Dec 21 1998
Asia Faces Growing Toxic Waste Dangers: says UN Environment Program director.
Despite the Basel Convention-- signed by 117 nations-- banning the export of toxic waste from rich countries to poor ,
underground concerns are importing banned pesticides, waste oils, heavy metals and hazardous medical waste,
materials from from broken ships (asbestos, lead-based paint, heavy metals, and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in India,
lead acid battery dumping in the Phillipines, waste oil dumping from South Korea in Thailand, Cambodia,
Indonesia.
Dec 18 1998
Australian Population Aging Rapidly
Dec 18 1998
China's Capital Bans Coal to Stamp out Pollution
Dec 18 1998
Raw Materials Use and the Environment: report from the World Watch Institute. Consumers, businesses, and governments around the world are finding ways to profit and prosper while simultaneously slashing
their use of wood, metal, stone, plastic, and other materials, removing many contributors to global warming, species loss, air and water pollution, lead poisoning, and a long list
of other environmental and health problems.
Dec 16 1998
Worrying New El Nino Effect Seen in Amazon Rainforests.
Dryness causes forest to emit carbon dioxide rather than absorbing it.
Dec 15 1998
Bottom trawlers decried as ocean clearcutters
Dec 15 1998
Shocking malnutrition found in North Korea ... from the New York Times. Food shortages, diarrhea due to impure water, and lack oh health care have contributed to the deaths of from 1 to 3 million, mostly children
in the last 5 years. Long-term malnutrition has caused stunted growth, and impaired mental development.
Dec 15 1998
Tehran Schools Shut for Second Day Due to Smog
Dec 15 1998
Plains could be in for droughts worse than Dust Bowl
Dec 15 1998
Indonesia Has Difficulties to Save Wild Animals. Due to protracted economic crises, conservation areas have low priority. Mining in conservation areas
and rampant poaching has threatened endangered species.
Indonesia now has 12 percent of the world's mammals, 10 percent of reptiles,
17 percent of birds, and 25 percent of the world's marine biotas
Dec 15 1998
World Food Program Aid Projects Fruitful in Central China
Dec 15 1998
Southern California Sea Otter Population down 12 Percent in Year
Dec 15 1998
Guangzhou to Ease Pollution Caused by Motorcycles. If you've ever been to SE Asia, you've experienced the choking fumes from motorcycles. The noise is also reduced by these measures. An example of what happens when
a country with a burgeoning population starts to become affluent. ... Karen
Dec 14 1998
Poisoned Environment in Nigeria. Industrial plants discharge toxic liquids and materials into rivers, carbon dioxide and dangerous gases and fumes into the air, and bury hazardous wastes threatening to poison underground water.
Life expectancy in Nigeria has dropped from 65 to 48 years. Gas flaring from oil production puts Nigeria ahead of all other countries in global environmental pollution.
Unsustainable population growth (doubling the world average of 2.1) in the country to blame for resource depletion and brings about food insecurity that
forces farmers to rely on chemical fertilizers. Shifting cultivation, bush-burning, uncontrolled grazing, reckless felling of trees have led to massive deforestation
and exposure of the topsoil which unduly over exposed the soil and the essential nutrients. Fishing methods that include the use
of dynamite and pesticides have damaged the ecosystem.
Dec 14 1998
World Bank- 41 Percent of Earth's Surface Eaten up by Desertification. Due to exceptionally high population growth, which has
increased demand for land and has led to migration to new lands that lack capacity.
World-wide economic loss estimated at 42.3 billion US dollars.
Dec 14 1998
In Canada's Frigid North, Warming Trend Seen as Foe, Not Friend
Dec 11 1998
Britain Wants UN Body to Tackle Threat to Oceans: coral reef damage result of rising temperatures and pollution. 10 % of the world's coral reefs beyond recovery; 60 % at medium to high risk.
Early warning sign of problems for the world's oceans.
Dec 10 1999 BBC
Micro Credit Plan for Bangladesh: small
loans given to families living below the poverty line.
(This plan, when
combined with education on family planning, is very effective in
slowing population growth)
Dec 10 1999 BBC
Urban growth means more hunger, says UN FAO
(Food and Agricultural Organization)
Full report is here
Dec 10 1998
Dangers of heat, humidity rising in US, due to global warming. Crucial factor in heat related deaths. From the New York Times.
Dec 10 1998
Italy Rejects Ambitious Floodgate Project to Protect Venice.
Only a stopgap measure, inadequate to protect the city as the Adriatic rises ever higher, pushed on by global warming.
Dec 9 1998
Looking at "Big Picture" of Marine Disease
Dec 9 1998
Landscape Changes Contribute to Climate Changes. Intensive farming, forest clearing and
other changes coincide with rising temperatures and rainfall shifts.
Dec 8 1998
Pennsylvania Dep Upgrades More Counties to Drought Warning
Dec 9 1998
Poverty to Blame for MALAWI'S Ecological Woes
Dec 8 1998
WWF warns about dangers to ocean
Dec 7 1998
Acid Rain Spreads to 40 Percent of China
Dec 7 1998
Industrial Pollution and Dust Crosses Pacific
Dec 6 1998
12 Primate Species under Threats of Extinction in Nigeria.
Due to uncontrolled logging, tree felling and gas flaring.
The gas flaring results in acid
rain which destroys fresh water fishes and forests. Nigeria has 28% of
the world's flared gas.
Dec 6 1998
Advocate for Population Policy Implementation - Zimbwabe
Where one in every four adults is HIV positive. 1997 fertility rate 4.3. No free contraceptives as from January next year due to a lack of funding. 99% of pregnant women who died in child birth the world over, were Africans.
Dec 2 1998
Population-Cairo Conference: Rich Countries Not Keeping Promises to Poor
Dec 1 1998
Official, Citing Changes in China, Urges Restoration of U.S. Foreign Population Funding
Nov 30 1998
Africa Remains Upbeat on Protection of the Environment
Nov 30 1998
China: Trees Come to Mighty Rivers' Rescue
Nov 27 1998
Record Year for Weather-Related Disasters According to theWorldwatch Institute, storms, floods, droughts, and fires caused at least $89 billion in economic
losses during the first eleven months of the year, which exceeds the
$55 billion in losses for the entire decade of the 1980s. US: weather-related claims $8 billion; Honduras and Nicaragua: $5 billion due to Hurricane Mitch; $30
billion: flooding of China's Yangtze River; $3.4 billion: Bangladesh flooding; $2.5 billion: ice storm in Canada and New England; $2 billion: floods in Turkey;
$2.5 billion: floods in Argentina and Paraguay. In many cases, due logging and agricultural clearing, forests dried out to the point where deliberately set fires were
able to spread quickly out of control, or the loss of forests and wetlands,which normally intercept rainfall and
allow it to be absorbed by the soil, permits water to rush across the land, carrying valuable topsoil with it. As the runoff races
across deforested land, it causes floods and landslides with the strength to wipe out roads, farms, and fisheries far downstream.
Nov 27 1998
Indonesia Fires Blur Singapore's Skies
Nov 26 1998
Brazil under Fire Over Plan to Cut Amazon Program
Nov 26 1998
People Are to Blame for Global Warming
Nov 23 1998
Egypt to Control Cairo's Air Pollution
Nov 23 1998
Tibet Has China's Largest Area of Nature Reserves
Nov 23 1998
Humans Destroy 16 Million Ha of Forests each Year
Nov 23 1998
Indonesia Fires Devastate 3 Mln Hectares
Nov 23 1998
Foes Warn Kyoto Global Warming Treaty won't Survive Senate
Nov 22 1998
World Air Pollution to Balloon, Says Energy Group
Carbon dioxide emissions will climb 70 percent by 2020 from 1995 levels without action
by leading economies to limit air pollution levels
Nov 20 1998
China Closes Polluting Factories near Three Gorges
Nov 17 1998
Hungary Faces Aging Population Problem
Nov 17 1998
Global warming may harm human health Warmer winters alter the distribution of mosquito-borne diseases, while extreme weather events such as floods and droughts are
spawning large "clusters" of infectious disease outbreaks.
Heat waves cause thousands of deaths in India and
hundreds in central Europe and the United States. Extreme droughts turn forests into tinderboxes, causing
air pollution leading to a dramatic rise in
the number of cases of eye irritation, respiratory illness and cardiovascular
disease. Floods lead to upsurges of cholera, malaria and Rift Valley fever.
Both floods, which encourage the growth of fungi, and
droughts, which promote whiteflies, locusts and rodents, have an impact on
agricultural production. Half of the world's agricultural production, worth $250
billion, is currently lost to pests and weeds and this figure could increase with
warmer and more unpredictable weather. From the Johns Hopkins Program on Health Effects of Global Environmental Change
Nov 16 1998
Nitrous Oxide Found in Tropical Waters of Pacific
Nov 13 1998
October Temperatures Make Month Second Warmest on Record WorldWide
Nov 13 1998
Sri Lanka Launches Sex Education Project for Youths
Nov 12 1998
Beijing Bans Burning of Dead Grass, Leaves
Nov 11 1998
Argentina to Voluntarily Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions
Nov 10 1998
U.S. water use declines despite growing population.
A 20 percent drop per person in 15 years. However, "the era of increasing water supplies is probably over".
Nov 10 1998
Zimbabwe's Air Hazardous to Health. Toxic emmissions from industrial processes and vehicles
Nov 9 1998
Letter Appeals to Beijingers Not to Eat Wild Animals
This is good, because any visitor to SE
Asia and China will notice the apparent LACK of wildlife
Oct 18 1998
US Teenage Pregnancy Rate Now Lowest in Two Decades
Oct 18 1998
Disputes over details could still trip up budget deal
"Essentially what that means is that groups that talk about family planning, that
advocate family planning, cannot have dollars -- U.S. dollars," said Rep. Nita
Lowey, D-New York.
Oct 18 1998
China Academy of Sciences to Step up Ecological, Environmental Study of Yangtze
Oct 15 1998
Japan Offers "Ecological Credit" to Russia. (geothermal vs coal energy sources)
Oct 15 1998
W.Bank Helps Bangladesh Fight Pollution
Oct 14 1998
September Temperatures at Record Highs for World
Oct 14 1998
Central Africa Moves to Look after Its Forest
Oct 14 1998
Significant Losses to California's Wild Lands
Oct 12 1998
Record El Nino Took Devastating Toll on Nation's Wildlife, Says National Wildlife
Federation Survey
Oct 9 1998
Heed the Public Outcry on Forests - Nairobi
Oct 8 1998
US Smog Threat Said Worse than Originally Thought
Oct 8 1998
Canada: Pollution at Lethal Level
Oct 8 1998
More Acid Rains for India
Oct 8 1998
Even Snow-Capped Mountains Are Contaminated
Oct 5 1998
Adding Contraceptive Coverage To Health Plans Estimated To Cost
Less Than $2 Per Month, Per Enrollee
Oct 5 1998
Kenya: Low Use of Contraceptives Causes Concern
Oct 5 1998
Haiti: Not enough Services for Fast-Growing Population
Oct 3 1998
Nearly 10 Percent of Vietnam's Wildlife in Threat of Extinction
Oct 1998
National Geographic October 1998: Population
Including a survey on population: you can participate!
Oct 1 1999 BBC
Destruction of natural world 'speeding up', according to WWF.
More that 30% of the natural world destroyed since 1970.
Living Planet Index
Sept 29 1998
Southern Chinese Ban on cutting natural forests
Sept 29 1998
South Pole Ozone Hole may be largest on record
Sept 28 1998
Brazil: More and More young people jobless
Sept 26 1998
African Population to Reach Zero Population Growth the Hard Way - AIDS
Populations devastated by AIDS and further threatened with food shortages,
water depletion, ecological collapse and social chaos.
Sept 24 1998
Chinese Report Says Population under Control.
Population that is 200 million less than what it
could have been had nothing been done.
Sept 17 1998
Global Energy Consumption Increasing.
Will grow by about 50% in 20 years, according to the World Energy Council.
Sept 17 1998 PAI
Foreign Aid Bill: House Passes
Global Gag Rule; Throws Free
Speech out Window
Sep 9 1999 BBC
World: The Poor get Poorer African people consume 20% less than they did 25 years ago, whereas the richest 20%
of people consume nearly half of the world's meat and fish. 70 - 80 countries have lower per capita incomes
than 10- 30 years ago.
From the UN Development Program.
Sept 2 1998
FDA approves "morning After" pill (otherwise known as emergency contraception)
Sept 2 1998
UNFPA releases 1998 State of World Report
The United Nations Population Fund released its annual
report at sites around the world. This year's report focused on "new generations"-the growing portions of the global population
under 24 and over 65, which would challenge "societies' ability to provide
education and health care for the young, and social, medical and
financial support for the elderly." The report also said world population would continue to grow by 80
million per year for the next decade.
Sept 2 1998 API
Senate approves Foreign Operations Bill
which included $18 billion
dollars for the International Monetary Fund and did not include
any restrictions on population assistance as was expected.
Aug 4, 1998
United Nations to Offer Sex Education Website.
July 1998 BBC
World's population warning
April 1998 ENN
Global warming could flood New York City
Apr 7 1998
Can economics save Suriname rain forest? Loss of biodiversity through deforestation not only removes
materials that could be used to create pharmaceuticals, but eliminates herbal remedies
09/01/98 Britannica.Com Earth Island Journal
Water: In Short Supply.
This article cites statistics from the Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health: 2.8 billion people in 48 countries will experience water shortages in the next 25 years. 31 countries already face shortages. The study said "it is important to act now" by slowing human population growth, conserving water and avoiding water pollution. Sydney Austrailia has a state-of-the-art water system that shows signs of Giardia and Cryptospondium. Even after a major upgrade of the system, the levels tested higher than before.