Environmental crises facing humanity in the new millennium

The United Nations Environment Programme’s (UNEP) assessment of the environmental crisis facing humanity in the new millennium lists a number of startling facts. These include:

· The global population is estimated to be around 6 billion.

· Nearly half of all people live in cities, 600 million live in shantytowns, a further 100 million are believed to be homeless and one billion urban residents are exposed to health threatening levels of air pollution.

· More than 1,3 billion live on less than US$1 a day.

· Since World War 2, the number of vehicles on the road has risen from 40 million to 680 million. By the year 2025 it is estimated that this figure will increase to one million.

· A survey of 200 scientists singled out water scarcity and climate change as the most serious environmental issues facing humanity in the 21^st century. Next came deforestation and desertification.

· By 2025 two out of three people will live in water stressed conditions. Polluted water contributes to the death of 15 million children under five every year.

· Malaria affects more than 500 million people in 90 countries, causing 1,5 million to 2,7 million deaths per year.

· Africa is the only continent on which poverty is expected to rise during the next century.

· About 500 million hectares of land have been affected by soil degradation since about 1950.

· About 75 percent of the world’s poor live in Asia.

· The estimated health cost of South East Asian forest fires during 1997 and 1998 was US$1,400 million.

· In 1996, 25 percent of the world’s approximately 4,630 mammal species and 11 percent of the 9,675 bird species were at significant risk of total extinction.

· Urban air pollution problems are reaching crisis dimensions in many cities in the developing world.