Especially during the last several decades, we are constantly being told that we need to change our malpractices in case we want to save our own habitat.

The Earth suffers a lot from our devastating lifestyles, so experts are suggesting ways to lower this negative impact.

Many of them explain that humanity is a plaque on Earth, and popular naturalist and nature television presenter Sir David Attenborough has publicly agreed with it.

Scientists explain that our planet survived just fine until we started having a devastating effect on it, and many naturalists warn of the population growth outstripping resources.

The 86-year-old broadcaster said:

“It’s coming home to roost over the next 50 years or so.

It’s not just climate change. It’s sheer space, places to grow food for this enormous horde. Either we limit our population growth or the natural world will do it for us, and the natural world is doing it for us right now.”

He added:

“We keep putting on programs about famine in Ethiopia -- that’s what’s happening. Too many people there. They can’t support themselves -- and it’s not an inhuman thing to say. It’s the case.

Until humanity manages to sort itself out and get a coordinated view about the planet, it’s going to get worse and worse.”

Paul Ehrlich, the president of the Centre for Conservation Biology at Stanford University, agrees that we can all take small measures to decrease our effect, including “government propaganda, taxes, giving every sexually active human being access to modern contraception and backup abortion, and, especially, giving women absolutely equal rights and opportunities with men might very well get the global population shrinkage required if a collapse is to be avoided”.

A study detailed in the October 2012 issue of the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology demonstrates that free, reliable birth control to women could prevent between 41%-71% of abortions in the United States.

Other scientists agree to some extent to these beliefs.

Jerry Karnas, population campaign director for the Center for Biological Diversity in Tucson, Ariz.,says:

“It’s clear that increasing population growth makes some of our biggest environmental challenges harder to solve, not easier.

What’s needed is not population control but a real emphasis on reproductive rights, women’s empowerment, universal access to birth control and education, so more freedom for folks to make better, more informed family planning choices.”

Attenborough supports the notion that limiting the human population could reduce the negative impact on the already diminishing planet.

He is a patron of the Optimum Population Trust that advocates voluntary population limitation.

Yet, while birth control remains a quite controversial topic, many others remind us that our negative environmental impact can be alleviated in other ways, like reducing consumption and food waste, for instance.

Sources:
www.livescience.com
www.ecosnippets.com
www.independent.co.uk