Category: Population

Population in Australia: 2050 versus 1950?

admin /22 April, 2010

Population in Australia: 2050 versus 1950?

by Michael R James

In a recent op-ed piece (What’s wrong with us) the New York Times, writer Bob Herbert lamented the disastrous lack of American investment in infrastructure.  In a blog comment that appears tailor-made for Australia, the answer is in Pogo’s classic line “We have met the enemy and he is us.”  And Bob Carr.

In last week’s Crikey Bob Carr and Dick Smith argue over whether our population should be 36 million or 28.5 million by 2050 but the real issue they ignore is that Australia and Australians must change their ways — that business as usual is inadequate.

Population and resources: She won’t be right, mate

admin /22 April, 2010

Population and resources: She won’t be right, mate

MICHAEL R. JAMES

February 16, 2010

Melbourne's Stuart McQuire has got his family daily consumption of mains water down to four litres per person per day. His house also exports power to the grid.

Melbourne’s Stuart McQuire has got his family daily consumption of mains water down to four litres per person per day. His house also exports power to the grid. Photo: Craig Abraham

 Changing the way we travel and live, as I have demonstrated in previous articles (Lleyton Hewitt and sitcoms), will be important if we are to accommodate a bigger population.

In this final article on The 7.30 Report’s population series, I will examine the question of the resources that would be needed for our future growth to 36 million or more people.

Climate change programs lack creditability

admin /20 April, 2010

Climate change programs lack credibility: audit

LENORE TAYLOR NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT

April 21, 2010

THE federal government could provide ”no documentation” on how it assessed the $4.45 billion ”clean energy initiative” announced in last year’s budget, according to an audit report detailing a litany of failures in both Howard and Rudd government greenhouse programs.

”There was no documentation held by the department relating to … advice on the costs and benefits of the proposal and the management of risks associated with implementing the program,” the audit found.

In another report the Audit Office reveals that federal and state governments have revised down by 15 per cent the amount of greenhouse gas abatement their policies will achieve by 2012.

A spokesman for the Resources Minister, Martin Ferguson, whose department administers the clean energy initiative, said, ”The department developed its policy advice using a large body of pre-existing documentation on carbon capture and storage” – the technology for which more than half the clean energy money is earmarked.

Dick Smith: gold-medal winning population growth not winning us friends.

admin /17 April, 2010

Dick Smith: gold-medal winning population growth not winning us friends
Entrepreneur and anti-population growth campaigner Dick Smith writes:
DR KIM STREATFIELD, POPULATION GROWTH, PROFESSOR GAVIN JONES, SKILLS AUSTRALIA

I am disappointed at the shallowness of much of what is passing for the so-called population debate. I expected the Murdoch press to push the big growth agenda, but I hoped for clearer thinking from Crikey and the so-called government and strategic decision-makers you say you’ve been talking to.

You say our policy makers are trapped in the gulf between public concerns about rapid population growth and Australia’s “moral responsibility” to take more immigrants from our Asian neighbours. Well, not for the first time the public has a better grasp of the situation than your experts.

Our gold-medal winning population growth wins us no friends in Asia. Most of our neighbours have spent years struggling with population issues of their own and they can only wonder why Australia is so keen to travel in the opposite direction. Our refugee intake looks ever more miserly as our population increases, and our climbing birth rate makes us the odd one out in the region. The constant back-flips over a few boat arrivals must appear ridiculous compared to the almost 500,000 people added to our population last year. We may not see it for what it is, but they do.

Australia’s Population Challenge

admin /13 April, 2010

25 March 2010

Australia's population growth is already leading to a range of pressures (stock.xchng)

Australia’s population challenge

Malcolm McIntosh, Tapan Sarker and Rose Boyd

Malcolm McIntosh

Population has been the great unspoken issue around the world. Politicians have been unwilling to offend some sections of their electorates with calls for lower birth rates and for reduced immigration. This is a subject that cuts into political, ethical, ethnic, and religious divides.

It is a fact that human beings have been fantastically successful in reproducing and conquering the natural environment such that we are now approaching seven billion people perched on a small landmass, relative to the total size of the Earth, with substantially less space available for producing food and providing clean, fresh water.

The fourth revolution for humanity, after agriculture, industrialisation and information, is sustainability – learning to live on planet Earth such that our children’s children can also enjoy the wonders of this small planet. This is both an ethical and a practical dilemma.

Stagnant Sydney set to pack in arrivals

admin /10 April, 2010

How much credence should we give to this report. Sounds like Govt.induced spin to me. 7mn. population in Sydney would be a disaster.   Neville Gillmore   Stagnant Sydney set to pack in arrivals Stephen Lunn and George Megalogenis From: The Australian April 10, 2010 12:00AM   Source: The Australian MELBOURNE and Brisbane have accommodated Continue Reading →

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