Future Populations & World Carrying Capacity

World as a community of 100 people.

Objectives:
At the end of this lesson, you should be able to:
  1. construct an age pyramid for a human population and, using it, predict the future growth rate of the population.
  2. evaluate factors that affect population growth in various countries.
  3. discuss human population growth on a regional basis.

Gateways to regional population data sites:

           The growth of every population is dependent on the same factors, among them:  fertility rate, generation time, density-dependent factors, density-independent factors, birth rate and the death rate.  Human beings are no exception.  All populations have an affect on their environment and all environments have a carrying capacity.  The creative nature of humans have allowed carrying capacities to change; engineering projects such as sewage systems and apartment buildings allow many more people to live in an area while doing no more damage to the environment.

          However, the impact on the environment varies with individuals.  As the standard of living has increased for people in developed countries, they have had a reduction in population growth and a greater impact on resources than those in developing countries.  This impact has often included environmental pollution which may lead to stricter environmental laws such as in the U.S.  People in developing countries use far fewer natural resources, but with increasing industrialization and rapid population growth, they are experiencing increasing environmental pollution as well.  Social and economic inequities can also lead to movement of people across borders.  This dynamic can lead to confrontation among labor, environmental, and governmental groups.  The discussion of how to equitably change immigration law in the U.S. is an example of the complexity surrounding population growth.

         These are the topics you should be prepared to discuss in today's class.  Be ready to answer questions about the vocabulary of population ecology and to graph the growth of populations identifying the parts of the graph and how factors such as competition or hurricanes affect growth.  But also you need to be prepared to discuss human population growth on a global scale and to contrast the impacts of individuals from developed and developing countries.

 Assignment for in-class discussion:

 1.     What is the name of the country for this assignment?  Is it a developed, developing or under-developed country?

2.    What is the country’s population size and density?

3.    What are the fertility rate, birth and death rates, and life expectancy?

4.    What are the Social, Ethnic, and Cultural background information describing the demographics of the population including population information for different groups?

5.    Explain the gender-associated issues in the country such as access to education and work among others. 

6.    Name two density-dependent factors and state how these factors affect population growth. Analyze how these factors may affect your country differently than other countries. 

7.    Name two density-independent factors and state how these factors affect population growth. Analyze how these factors may affect your country differently than other countries. 

8.    Print a population pyramid for this population, state how the population structure will affect future population growth, and explain the shape of the pyramid.  This site will give you data: U.S. Census Bureau:  International Data Base. 

 9.    What is the evidence that the country is at, near, or above its local carrying capacity? 

*In-class activity by your group:

Paper Assignment due the week after this discussion:  60 pts.

  1. Read the Moodle posting of at least one other student.
  2. Write a substantial response (about 150 words) and post it as a “Reply” to the other student’s posting. (14 pts)
  3. Cite your references correctly.  Failure to do so is plagiarism.  See this link for citation format.