Implications of Human Population Growth: Urbanization & Agriculture

Urbanization

  • 2007: more people lived in urban areas rather than rural for the first time

    • More than 80% of people live in urban areas

  • Reasons for migration

    • Farming is unpredictable

      • Number/size of farms have shrunk, people move to cities looking for work

    • Compact living

      • Reduced transportation costs

      • Improve job opportunities

  • Cities are expanding

    • Farmland is being used for urban purposes

      • Between 1966-1986 330km squared of rural land was taken over for the city of Toronto

    • Water cycle disrupted

      • Clean water supplies in cities is a constant struggle

    • Emissions from traffic creating pollution

Feeding the World

  • Humans need food to survive

    • Food secured through agriculture or hunting/gathering

  • Enough food is produced each year to feed the world

    • Tens of millions of people suffer from malnutrition and starvation

  • 5 major causes

    • Natural Disasters: floods, drought, other natural disasters destroying crops

    • Conflict: governments spending more money on war than food, and refugees are fleeing farmland for safety

    • Poverty: people don't have the money, land, or tools to grow or buy food

    • Poor Agriculture or Infrastructure: many parts of the world lack proper roads, storage facilities, and irrigation

    • Over-exploitation of Environment: poor farming practices, deforestation, over-cropping and overgrazing exhausts the fertility of the soil

Food Sources

  • 3 general food sources

    • Croplands

    • Rangelands

    • Ocean fisheries

  • Since 1950, dramatic increase in food production

    • Technological advancements

    • Fertilizers/pesticides

  • Facing Challenges to feed 7 billion people without causing environmental harm

    • Human activities negatively impacting earth

      • Pollution, overgrazing land, overfishing, etc.

    • 10 000 species used to be used as food sources

      • Today: 14 plant, 8 terrestrial species

      • Wheat, rice, corn produce half of calorie intake

      • Fish, shellfish 7% of world's food and 6% of protein intake

Industrialized vs Traditional

  • Industrialized

    • Uses large amount of fossil fuel energy, water, synthetic pesticides

    • Produces 80% of the world's food supply

      • Used on 1/4 of farmland

      • Mostly in developed countries

        • Developing countries: plantation

        • Developed countries: livestock production

    • Traditional

      • Uses human/animal labor

      • Either only produces enough for a specific family or enough to feed family and still have some income

      • Used in developing countries

        • 20% of world's food supply

        • 2.7 billion people (39% of population) use this

      • Eg. nomadic livestock herding or crops

Agriculture in Canada

  • Canada has 5% of the worlds available land

  • agriculture contributed to $87.9 billion dollars to the economy

  • 68 million hectares has been farmed in Canada over the last 50 years

  • $21 billion dollars of surplus agricultural goods are exported

Challenges facing Canadian farmers

only about 7% of all land in Canada is actually farmable. Factors such as precipitation, soil quality and temperature are major factors affecting farmers. 83% of all farmland is held in the prairies leading to a dividing up of where products are produced across Canada. Ontario and Quebec produce large amounts of animail farms ranging from poultry, pigs and cows. Maritime Provinces and know best for there potatoes and seafood while British Columbia is know for fruit, wine and salmon.


challenges facing Canadian farmers

  • increased transportation cost

  • rising energy cost

  • harsh weather and pests

  • inflation

  • legal challenges

  • increase in cost of equipment

Sustainable Agriculture (growth of food using less energy, resources)

  • sustainable or low-input technologies

  • based on ecological knowledge to increase yield

  • increases biodiversity

  • reduces the use of pesticides

its goal is to produce high-quality, nutritious food with little reliance on pesticides and fertilizers. Organic famers only use natural pesticides and manure on there crops. Livestock's are raised organically without antibiotics and growth hormones. Organic and sustainable farming helps to produce high quality food with little or no impact on the environment.