As world population continues to grow, natural resources are under increasing pressure, threatening public health and social and economic development, warns a new report from the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. The Global Challenge , published by the Johns Hopkins Population Information Program . Most developed economies currently consume resources much faster than they can regenerate.
Sustainable development requires slower population growth.
While the rate of population growth has slowed over the past few decades, the absolute number of people continues to increase by about 1 billion every 13 years, and the environment continues to deteriorate. Over the past 10 years environmental conditions generally have either failed to improve or appear to be getting worse, a review of the evidence finds. For the future, how people protect or abuse the environment could largely determine whether living standards improve or deteriorate, according to the authors. Air pollution kills 3 million more. In 64 of 105 developing countries, population has grown faster than food supplies.