ENVIRONMENAL DEGRADATIONNeha Patil, 4th sem, K.L.S.GIT , Belgaum

Muthu Gomathy, 4th sem, K.L.S.GIT , Belgaum

ABSTRACT

One of the worst threats facing the planet today is environmental degradation. It is sad that each new day indicates that the level of degradation that the planet is exposed is on the increase. Degradation of the environment is bound to make life intolerable for all forms of living things man included now and in the days to come. Studies carried out by major eminent organizations indicate a very alarming rate at which the environment is deteriorating. It is due to this reason that the High Level Panel of the United Nations has noted environmental degradation to be among the top ten threats facing man. Environmental degradation is enlisted and it shares space with threats such as poverty, civil war and terrorism. This clearly shows that we are heading into certain calamity. As noted by Clark (2009), environmental degradation is the process by which the natural environment undergoes degeneration to a point that the health and biodiversity of the earth is exposed to drastic deterioration. Environmental degradation is nothing but disgracing organic and natural assortments and the quality of all living things present on earth

MOTHER NATURE

The natural environment, with all its ecosystem services, comprises the entire basis for life on the planet. Its value is therefore impossible to quantify or even model. The state of environment has – at any given stage – effects on food production through its role in water, nutrients, soils, climate and weather as well as on insects that are important for pollination and regulating infestations. The state of ecosystems also influences the abundance of pathogens, weeds and pests, all factors with a direct bearing on the quality of available cropland, yields and harvests.

What is environmental degradation?

Environmental degradation is defined as any threat towards the survival of the ecosystem caused by the deterioration of resources such as

Air Water Soil

Environmental degradation represents the greatest challenge facing the world today because it poses not only as a threat to the survival of the ecosystem but also to our existence and the security of states. Thus environmental degradation has a substantial influence on the economic, social and political sphere thus posing as the greatest challenges to overcome today. The deterioration of the environment was first brought to the public’s attention in 1972 at the United Nation Conference on the Human Environment questioning the importance and urgency of the issue. The United Nations Environment Programme was later established along with various non-government actors to tackle environmental problems such as climate change, the thinning of the stratospheric ozone layer and transnational pollution such as acid rain. Environmental degradation has now become a global issue yet with the governance of international law, the sustainability of the environment is still under threat as issues such as whaling cannot be stopped. Hence the future of the environment is still unclear due to the presence of loop

holes in the law.

How Environmental Degradation Occurs

Environmental changes are based on many factors including:

Urbanization

Population growth

Economic growth

Intensification of agriculture

Increase in energy use

Increase in transportation

Water deterioration

One major component of environmental degradation is the depletion of the resource of fresh water on Earth. Approximately only 2.5% of all of the water on Earth is fresh water, with the rest being salt water. 69% of the fresh water is frozen in ice caps located on Antarctica and Greenland, so only 30% of the 2.5% of fresh water is available for consumption.Fresh water is an exceptionally important resource, since life on Earth is ultimately dependent on it. Water transports nutrients and chemicals within the biosphere to all forms of life, sustains both plants and animals, and moulds the surface of the Earth with transportation and deposition of materials. The current top three uses of fresh water account for 95% of its consumption; approximately 85% is used for irrigation of farmland, golf courses, and parks, 6% is used for domestic purposes such as

indoor bathing uses and outdoor garden and lawn use, and 4% is used for industrial purposes such as processing, washing, and cooling in manufacturing centers.It is estimated that one in three people over the entire globe are already facing water shortages, almost one-fifth of the world’s population live in areas of physical water scarcity, and almost one quarterof the world’s population live in a developing country that lacks the necessary infrastructure to use water fromavailable rivers and aquifers. Water scarcity is an increasing problem due to many foreseen issues in the future,including population growth, increased urbanization, higher standards of living, and climate change.

Climate Change While abrupt displacements may happen, we primarily expect to see climate change causing a gradual migration by people searching for more fertile land—or for other economic opportunities to replace lost livelihoods. Humans are introducing toxic gases into the atmosphere. This is not only in gaseous form but also in liquid and solid states. These wastes are introduced into the environment at levels that are undoubting beyond the rates of decomposing or dissipating. The building up of carbon dioxide gases in the atmosphere has led to global warming (DeSombre 2009). Our modern lives which include cars, factories, big livestock farms and power plants have led to high volumes of Green House Gases being released into the atmosphere. Average temperatures are feared to increase by more than twelve degrees Fahrenheit before the end of this century due to the increase of these gases into the atmosphere. This increase will make the world inhabitable especially for man especially because a simple increase in temperature such as seven point two degrees Fahrenheit can cause a catastrophic domino impact leading to extreme weather conditions that may lead to water and food shortages and fatal floods (Zuckerman and Jefferson 2010).CFCs, or chlorofluorocarbons, are the primary cause of ozone depletion.  When industrial processes release these chemicals, they rise into the stratosphere and degrade the ozone. Acid rain, smog and poor air quality have been the result of air pollution.  Both industrial operations and automobiles have released gigantic amounts of emissions that have intensified these problems.

Climate change and temperature :Climate change affects the Earth’s water supply in a large number of ways. It is predicted that the mean global temperature will rise in the coming years due to a number of forces affecting the climate, the amount of atmospheric CO2 will rise, and both of these will influence water resources; evaporation depends strongly on temperature and moisture availability, which can ultimately affect the amount of water available to replenish groundwater supplies. Transpiration from plants can be affected by a rise in atmospheric CO2, which can decrease their use of water, but can also raise their use of water from possible increases of leaf area. Temperature increase can decrease the length of the snow season in the winter and increase the intensity of snowmelt in warmer seasons, leading to peak runoff of snowmelt earlier in the season, affecting soil moisture, flood and drought risks, and storage capacities depending on the area. Warmer winter temperatures cause a decrease in snowpack, which can result in diminished water resources during summer. This is especially important at mid-latitudes and in mountain regions that depend on glacial runoff to replenish their river systems and groundwater supplies, making these areas increasingly vulnerable to water shortages over time; an increase in temperature will initially result in a rapid rise in water melting from glaciers in the summer, followed by a retreat in glaciers and a decrease in the melt and consequently the water supply every year as the size of these glaciers get smaller and smaller. Thermal expansion of water and increased melting of oceanic glaciers from an increase in temperature gives way to a rise in sea level, which can affect the fresh water supply of coastal areas as well; as river mouths and deltas with higher salinity get pushed further inland, an intrusion of saltwater results in an increase of salinity in reservoirs and aquifers. Sea-level rise may also consequently be caused by a depletion of groundwater,as climate change can affect the hydrologic cycle in a number of ways. Uneven distributions of increased temperatures and increased precipitation around the globe results in water surpluses and deficits,but a global decrease in groundwater suggests a rise in sea level, even after meltwater and thermal expansion were accounted for which can provide a positive feedback to the problems sea-level rise causes to fresh-water supply.

A rise in air temperature results in a rise in water temperature, which is also very significant in water degradation, as the water would become more susceptible to bacterial growth. An increase in water temperature can also affect ecosystems greatly because of a species’ sensitivity to temperature, and also by inducing changes in a body of water’s self-purification system from decreased amounts of dissolved oxygen in the water due to rises in temperature.

Climate change and precipitation

A rise in global temperatures is also predicted to correlate with an increase in global precipitation, but because of increased runoff, floods, increased rates of soil erosion, and mass movement of land, a decline in water quality is probable, while water will carry more nutrients, it will also carry more contaminants.[5] While most of the attention about climate change is directed towards global warming and greenhouse effect, some of the most severe effects of climate change are likely to be from changes in precipitation, evapotranspiration, runoff, and soil moisture. It is generally expected that, on average, global precipitation will increase, with some areas receiving increases and some decreases.Climate models show that while some regions should expect an increase in precipitation,such as in the tropics and higher latitudes, other areas are expected to see a decrease, such as in the subtropics; this will ultimately cause a latitudinal variation in water distribution.[5] The areas receiving more precipitation are also expected to receive this increase during their winter and actually become drier during their summer,[8] creating even more of a variation of precipitation distribution. Naturally, the distribution of precipitation across the planet is very uneven, causing constant variations in water availability in respective locations. Changes in precipitation affect the timing and magnitude of floods and droughts, shift runoff processes, and alter groundwater recharge rates. Vegetation patterns and growth rates will be directly affected by shifts in precipitation amount and distribution, which will in turn affect agriculture as well as natural ecosystems. Decreased precipitation will deprive areas of water, causing water tables to fall and reservoirs and wetlands, rivers, and lakes to empty and possibly an increase in evaporation and evapotranspiration, depending on the accompanied rise in temperature.Groundwater reserves will be depleted, and the remaining water has a greater chance of being of poor quality from saline or contaminants on the land surface.

Land degradation Environmental degradation due to unsustainable human practices and activities now seriously endangers the entire production platform of the planet.Land degradation and conversion of cropland for non-food production including biofuels, cotton and others are major threats that could reduce the available cropland by 8–20% by 2050. Species infestations of pathogens, weeds and insects, combined with water scarcity from overuse and the melting of the Himalayas glaciers, soil erosion and depletion as well as climate change may reduce current yields by at least an additional 5–25% by 2050, in the absence of policy intervention. These factors entail only a portion of the environment covering direct effects. The indirect effects, including socio-economic responses, may be considerably larger.

LOSS OF CROPLAND FROM URBAN DEVELOPMENTInfrastructure and urban development is increasing rapidly (UN, 2008). Settlement primarily occurred at the cost of cropland, as people historically settled in the most productive locations (e.g., Maizel et al. 1998; Goldewijk, 2001, 2005; Klein Goldewijk and Beusen, 2009). Hence, as settlements, towns and cities grow, the adjacent cropland is reduced to accommodate urban infrastructure such as roads and housing. Globally, estimates of the extent of built-up areas in 2000 range from 0.2% – 2.7% of the total land area (Potere and Schneider, 2007) with 5 of the 7 estimates below 0.5%. Most of the differences can be explained by the various definitions of built-up area and differences between satellite derived and inventory based data. All these percentages relate to about 0.3–3.5 million km2 of land worldwide, which at first appear to be unavailable for producing food. However, UNDP (1996) estimated that 15– 20% of the world’s food is produced in (peri-)urban areas (although it is not clear whether parts of this peri-urban area are already included in cropland inventories or not; besides there is large uncertainty and variability by city/region of the UNDP estimate). Preliminary future estimates based on the HYDE methodology (Beusen and Klein Goldewijk, in prep) with the medium population growth variant of the UN (2008) reveal that with an expected increase of the global urban population from 2.9 billion people in 2000 to 5 billion in 2030 and 6.4 billion in 2050, the built-up area is likely to increase from 0.4% of the total global land area in 2000 to about 0.7% by 2030, and to 0.9% by 2050, corresponding roughly to 0.5 million km2, 0.9 million km2 and 1.2 million km2, respectively.

The computed ratio of built-up area/cropland area is 3.5% in 2000, 5.1% in 2030 and 7% in 2050, respectively. This means that if all additional built-up area would be at the expense of cropland (Stehfest et al., 2008), a total of 0.37 million km2 of cropland would be lost by 2030, and another 0.30 million km2 by 2050.

LOSS OF CROPLAND AREA FROM LAND DEGRADATION

About 2 billion ha of the world’s agricultural land have been degraded because of deforestation and inappropriate agricultural practices (Pinstrup-Andersen and Pandya-Lorch, 1998). In spite of global improvements on some parts of the land, unsustainable land use practices result in net losses of cropland productivity – an average of 0.2%/year. The combined effects of competition for land from growing populations, reduced opportunity for migration and rotation along with higher livestock densities, result in frequent overgrazing and, hence, loss of long-term productivity. Satellite measurements show that between 1981 and 2003, there was an absolute decline in the productive land area (as Net Primary Productivity) across 12% of the global land area. The areas affected are home to about 1–1.5 billion people, some 15–20% of the global population (Bai et al., 2007).

A number of authors including den Biggelaar et al. (2004) estimate that globally, 20,000–50,000 km2 of land are lost annually through land degradation, chiefly soil erosion, with losses 2–6 times higher in Africa, Latin America and Asia than in North America and Europe. The major degrading areas are in Africa south of the Equator, Southeast Asia, Southern China, North-Central Australia and the pampas of South America. Some 950,000 km2 of land in Sub-Saharan Africa is threatened with irreversible degradation if nutrient depletion continues (Henao and Baanante, 2006). In most parts of Asia, forest is shrinking, agriculture is gradually expanding to marginal lands and land degradation is accelerating through nutrient leaching and soil erosion. In fact, about 20% of the agricultural land in Asia has been degraded over the last several decades (Foley et al., 2005). The pace of degradation is much higher in environmentally fragile areas, such as on the mountains.

Unfortunate Impacts of Environmental Degradation

When factories produce harmful chemicals and toxic waste into bodies of water, humans suffer. Pesticides and fertilizers can also get into a region's water system and pollute it. Drinking water is contaminated. Some residing in third-world countries are highly effected by the degradation of our planet and theseunhealthy practices cause the following:

Illnesses

Death in children

Death in adults

Poverty

In many countries in Africa, crop harvests are falling as consumption increases. People are finding less nutritious food to eat. One argument held is that while fields in wealthier nations are used to grow crops for biofuel, poorer countries, especially those around the Equator, are vulnerable to weather changes, water shortages, and urbanization. All of these factors are increasing the health and lives of thousands. Some scientists and environmentalists are asking that non-food items and agriculture waste be used as alternative fuel for vehicles instead.

Losing Earth's Beauty

As humans dump waste products, use chemicals, and over fish in the oceans and seas, areas of beauty such as coral reefs are damaged. At times the destruction is so great that is cannot be reversed. We are killing our planet and the consequences are tremendous.

One example of this lies within the coast lands of Thailand. Here marine and coastal resources at risk. Vast areas of mangrove wetlands have been lost. Coral reefs continue to suffer degradation, and the total fish available for catching is declining. Not only is the degradation causing marine and coastal resources to be lost, but this issue holds large economic

problems. When there are not enough fish to catch, fishermen are without income to support themselves and their families. In some coastal towns, the shores are eroding at a rate of one to five meters per year. This results in an annual loss of more than six billion baht ($150 million) in economic terms.

Ineffective international policies

Ineffective interational policies leave the future of the environment in a critical state with carbon dioxide level rising out of control. It is predicted that the Earth’s temperature will increase by “11-degrees Fahrenheit by the end of the century” (ABC Science, 2010). Signs of the Earth warming up such as the melting of polar glaciers have more than doubled since “1988 resulting to an estimated increase of 27 centimetres in sea levels by 2100” (Global change, 2008). The phenomenon of globalisation has a negative impact on the environment with an increase in sulphur pollution released by the burning of petrochemicals and accumulates in fat. China suffered a $45 billion lost in productivity caused by deforestation. Sulphur pollution threatens our survival causing “cancer and damage to the immune and nervous systems in young children” (Global Change, 2008). The increase in trade caused by globalisation cause a raise in the use of non-renewable resources. Competitive among economies will deter nations and businesses to comply with international law which will place their business at risk; hence the use of ‘greenwash’ to cover up their economic activities.

How to Stop Degradation

There are ways which you can help to decrease degradation in our environment. Some of these include:

Purchase recycled products

Conserve water

Do not litter or toss waste into inappropriate places

Conserve energy

Join an awareness group

Talk with others about the impacts of environmental degradation

Be an advocate to save our planet!

Conclusion

Environmental issues are becoming a central debate on the international agenda. Climate change is arguably the most important issue threatening our existence. Therefore environmental degradation represents the greatest challenge facing the world today. Globalisation is the cause of environmental degradation as a result of the rising in consumption levels, resource depletion and rising greenhouse gas emissions threatening sustainable development creating social and political instability. Globalisation gave rise to global environmental governance through the establishment of transnational green politics and NGOs to raise awareness and address the serious of this international agenda. However there are issues associated with ‘governing the common’. Problems such as compliance by countries and organisations pose a threat to environmental stability. Hence tackling environmental degradation will be a difficult task when full compliance is required to tackle climate change and transnational pollution head on. Therefore the future of the environment is uncertain even though laws to phase out the use of CFC to prevent further depletion of the ozone layer was proven effective, however weaknesses in international law in tackling issues such as climate change and the greenhouse emission will cause further deterioration of the environment later on. Therefore environmental degradation remains the greatest challenge facing the world today with a lot at stake.