A presentation by: Karla Burguete

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Overpopulation

What is overpopulation?

Overpopulation is an excessive amount of population of an area. This excessive amount of people can cause overcrowding, depletion of natural resources, and environmental deterioration.

Did you know?

The world’s population is now growing faster than ever at a rate of 220,000 people per day!

Overpopulation in South Asia

Overpopulation is a problem in many places of the world but today I will be focusing on overpopulation in South Asia. This area includes: Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Bruma, Nepal, Maldives Islands, and Sri Lanka.

Where is it best to study overpopulation?

India is the best country to study overpopulation. India has a population of 1.2 billion people which is more than one sixth of the world’s population! This country is a great example on how overpopulation can affect a country and its people.

What kind of problems come with overpopulation?

One thing is sure, earth’s resources are limited. Things like water, land, natural forests, animals, and many more things are at risk due to overpopulation. People need resources like water and land to survive so if those resources are lacking the people are at a major risk.

Where has our water gone?One of the scariest things about

losing water is that you cannot make it if you use all of it. It is a natural resource that once you use up, you cannot get back. This is why overpopulation can be a huge problem. People need water to survive, but when too many people are depending on the same water source to survive, that can become a problem.

Where has our water gone? (cont’d)

Water is used for almost everything. It is used for drinking, cooking, cleaning, watering crops, etc. When water becomes scarce the people cannot do these things anymore. Water is very important and overpopulation is putting it at risk. The lack of water is killing many and the problem always seems to go back to overpopulation. Regulations on how much water each family gets is still not enough to make sure there is still water for everyone.

What other problems can water scarcity bring?

Other than people dying because of the lack of water there are other problems that arise due to its scarcity. When a new water source is found many people fight over this source to meet the needs of their families. This creates “Water Wars.” People have killed each other trying to get to that source and grab as much water as possible. Not only is overpopulation killing people of thirst, but also it is making people kill each other for the little water there is available.

What about housing? Another huge problem that

overpopulation brings is the lack of housing. There can only be so much housing before they start running out of space to put more houses. The little spaces left here and there may become very expensive. The people live in very crowded places and yet more people are coming in the cities looking for homes. There is poor sanitation due to the fact that houses are being built at a really fast pace. There is no time for perfection so, many things are missing.

Poor SanitationThere are thousands and thousands of

homes without proper sanitation. Having poor sanitation means that their sewer system is either in real bad conditions or non existent. This can cause health problems because the amount of bacteria increases and the people breath in these harmful and sometimes deadly bacteria. This is a huge problem because many countries that suffer from overpopulation don’t have health insurance or their towns are lacking the proper facilities to treat their people for problems like lung cancer, heart disease, etc.

The lack of housing is bringing more problems…

The lack of housing is bringing more problems. There is no more space for building new houses so what the people have to do is start getting rid of forests to make more space for housing. This is causing something known as deforestation. Deforestation is very dangerous because trees are big producers of oxygen. This makes the environment more vulnerable to things like pollution.

Animals are affected too

Due to deforestation many animals are left homeless. Animals that would survive eating vegetation are now dying of starvation. This causes a chain reaction where other animals start to die because of the lack of food resources. Many species are becoming extinct. There is not enough time for the animals to keep reproducing because their environment is being destroyed.

The air you breathThe streets are packed with people

driving their motorized vehicles. The vehicles emit gases to the air that are harmful to the atmosphere and the people’s health. The more people there are the more vehicles there will be on the streets and the more vehicles there are the more air pollution there will be. This puts the people at risk of pulmonary diseases like pulmonary cancer and even heart disease.

In Conclusion

As said before, Earth’s resources are limited. In places like the United States, our resources seem infinite and people don’t have to worry about anything becoming scarce. In other places, for example India, there are so many people that resources have become scarce and people do worry about meeting the needs of their families. People there don’t have enough water, they don’t have enough housing, they are getting rid of forests and killing animals , they suffer from diseases due to poor sanitation and pollution, etc. India is a great example to show the effects of overpopulation to a country because we can compare ourselves to them and see that having too much of something, in this case people, is not always a good thing.