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Over-consumption
 
 
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Over-consumption is a theory related to overpopulation
Overpopulation

Overpopulation is a condition where an organism's numbers exceed the carrying capacity of its habitat. In common parlance, the term usually refers to the relationship between the world population and its environment , the Earth....
, referring to situations where per capita
Per capita

Per capita is a Latin phrase meaning per head with per meaning "through" or "by" and capita meaning "heads." Both words together equate to the phrase "for each head."...
 consumption
Consumption (economics)

Consumption is a common concept in economics, and gives rise to derived concepts such as consumer debt. Generally consumption is defined by opposition to Production theory basics....
 is so high that even in spite of a moderate population density
Population density

Population density is a measurement of population per unit area or unit volume. It is frequently applied to living organisms, and particularly to humans....
, sustainability
Sustainability

Sustainability, in a broad sense, is the ability to maintain a certain process or state. It is now most frequently used in connection with biological and human systems....
 is not achieved. The theory was coined to augment the discussion of overpopulation, which reflects issues of carrying capacity
Carrying capacity

The supportable population of an organism, given the food, habitat, drinking water and other necessities available within an environment is known as the environment's carrying capacity for that organism....
 without taking into account per capita
Per capita

Per capita is a Latin phrase meaning per head with per meaning "through" or "by" and capita meaning "heads." Both words together equate to the phrase "for each head."...
 consumption, by which developing nations are evaluated to consume more than their land can support.






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Energy Per Capita
Co2 Per Capita Per Country
Over-consumption is a theory related to overpopulation
Overpopulation

Overpopulation is a condition where an organism's numbers exceed the carrying capacity of its habitat. In common parlance, the term usually refers to the relationship between the world population and its environment , the Earth....
, referring to situations where per capita
Per capita

Per capita is a Latin phrase meaning per head with per meaning "through" or "by" and capita meaning "heads." Both words together equate to the phrase "for each head."...
 consumption
Consumption (economics)

Consumption is a common concept in economics, and gives rise to derived concepts such as consumer debt. Generally consumption is defined by opposition to Production theory basics....
 is so high that even in spite of a moderate population density
Population density

Population density is a measurement of population per unit area or unit volume. It is frequently applied to living organisms, and particularly to humans....
, sustainability
Sustainability

Sustainability, in a broad sense, is the ability to maintain a certain process or state. It is now most frequently used in connection with biological and human systems....
 is not achieved. The theory was coined to augment the discussion of overpopulation, which reflects issues of carrying capacity
Carrying capacity

The supportable population of an organism, given the food, habitat, drinking water and other necessities available within an environment is known as the environment's carrying capacity for that organism....
 without taking into account per capita
Per capita

Per capita is a Latin phrase meaning per head with per meaning "through" or "by" and capita meaning "heads." Both words together equate to the phrase "for each head."...
 consumption, by which developing nations are evaluated to consume more than their land can support. Green parties and the ecology movement
Ecology movement

The global ecology movement is based upon environmental protection, and is one of several new social movements that emerged at the end of the 1960s....
 often argue that consumption per person, or ecological footprint
Ecological footprint

The ecological footprint is a measure of human demand on the Earth's ecosystems. It compares human demand with planet Earth's Ecology capacity to regenerate....
, is typically lower in poor than in rich nations. However their claims are often unsupported.

Effects

A fundamental effect of over-consumption is a reduction in the planet's carrying capacity
Carrying capacity

The supportable population of an organism, given the food, habitat, drinking water and other necessities available within an environment is known as the environment's carrying capacity for that organism....
. Excessive unsustainable consumption will exceed the long term carrying capacity of its environment (ecological overshoot) and subsequent resource depletion
Resource depletion

Resource depletion is an economics term referring to the exhaustion of raw materials within a region. Natural resource are commonly divided between renewable resources and non-renewable resources....
, environmental degradation
Environmental degradation

Environmental degradation is the deterioration of the environment through depletion of resources such as air, water and soil; the destruction of ecosystems and the extinction of wildlife....
 and reduced ecological health
Ecological health

Ecological health or ecological integrity or ecological damage is used to refer to symptoms of an ecosystem's pending loss of carrying capacity, its ability to perform nature's services, or a pending ecocide, due to cumulative causes such as pollution....
.

The scale of modern life's over-consumption has enabled an overclass
Overclass

Overclass is a recent and pejorative term for the most powerful group in a social hierarchy. Users of the term generally imply excessive and unjust privilege and exploitation of the rest of society....
 to exist, displaying affluenza
Affluenza

Affluenza is a term used by critics of consumerism, a portmanteau of wealth and influenza. Sources define this term as follows:Proponents of the term consider the costs of prizing material wealth vastly outweigh the benefits....
 and obesity
Obesity

Obesity is a condition in which excess body fat has accumulated to an extent that health may be negatively affected. It is commonly defined as a body mass index of 30 kg/m2 or higher....
. However once again both of these claims are controversial with the latter being correlated to other factors more so than over-consumption.

In the long term these effects can lead to increased conflict over dwindling resources and in the worst case a Malthusian catastrophe
Malthusian catastrophe

A Malthusian catastrophe was originally foreseen to be a forced return to subsistence-level conditions once population growth had outpaced agriculture production, costs, and pricing....
.

Economic Growth


However, the Worldwatch Institute
Worldwatch Institute

The Worldwatch Institute is a globally-focused environmental research organization based in Washington, D.C. Worldwatch was named as one of the top ten sustainable development research organizations by Globescan Survey of Sustainability Experts....
 said the booming economies of China and India are planetary forces that are shaping the global biosphere
Biosphere

The biosphere is the global sum of all ecosystems. From the broadest Geophysiology point of view, the biosphere is the global ecology system integrating all living beings and their relationships, including their interaction with the elements of the lithosphere, hydrosphere, and Earth's atmosphere....
. The State of the World
State of the World

"State of the World" is a song by United States contemporary R&B/pop music singer Janet Jackson....
 2006 report said the two countries' high economic growth
Economic growth

Economic growth is the increase in the amount of the goods and services produced by an economics over time. It is conventionally measured as the percent rate of increase in real gross domestic product, or real GDP....
 exposed the reality of severe pollution. The report states

The world's ecological capacity is simply insufficient to satisfy the ambitions of China, India, Japan, Europe and the United States as well as the aspirations of the rest of the world in a sustainable way,


Counteractions

Movements and ideologies have formed in recent decades to reduce over-consumption. These include anti-consumerism
Anti-consumerism

Anti-consumerism refers to the socio-political movement against consumerism, the equation of personal happiness with consumption and the purchase of material possessions....
, ecological economics
Ecological economics

Ecological economics is a transdisciplinary field of academic research that aims to address the interdependence of human economies and natural ecosystems....
, freeganism
Freeganism

Freeganism is an anti-consumerism lifestyle whereby people employ alternative living strategies based on "limited participation in the conventional economy and minimal consumption of resources"....
 and green economics. However laudable, these efforts mathematically cannot mitigate the consumption impacts projected from population projections through the year 2050.

See also

  • Artificial demand
    Artificial demand

    Artificial demand constitutes demand for something that, in the absence of exposure to the vehicle of creating demand, would not exist. It has controversial applications in microeconomics and advertising....
  • Energy conservation
    Energy conservation

    Energy conservation is the practice of decreasing the quantity of energy used. It may be achieved through efficient energy use, in which case energy use is decreased while achieving a similar outcome, or by reduced consumption of energy services....
  • Environmental studies
    Environmental studies

    Environmental studies is the systematic study of human behavior with their environment. It is a broad field of study that includes the natural environment, built environments, social environments, organizational environments, and the sets of relationships between them....
  • Externality
    Externality

    In economics, an externality or spillover is a positive or negative impact on a party not directly involved in an economic transaction. In such a case, prices do not reflect the full costs or benefits in production or consumption of a product or service....
  • Peak oil
    Peak oil

    Peak oil is the point in time when the maximum rate of global petroleum Extraction of petroleum is reached, after which the rate of production enters terminal decline....
  • Preorder Economy
    Preorder Economy

    A preorder economy is a type of proposed future economy where the exact demand for goods is known ahead of time, before any material production takes place....
  • Family planning
    Family planning

    Family planning is people Planning when to have children, and the use of birth control and other techniques to implement such plans. Other techniques commonly used include sex education, prevention and management of sexually transmitted disease, pre-conception counseling and pregnancy#management , and infertility....
  • I PAT
    I PAT

    I PAT is the lettering of a formula put forward to describe the impact of human activity on the Environment .In words:This describes how our growing population, affluence, and technology contribute toward our environmental impact....


External links

  • at NationMaster
    NationMaster

    NationMaster is a web site that features a large database of variables for comparing countries. A wide range of demographic indicators are covered including literacy rates, taxation levels, and murders per capita....
  • by Albert J. Fritsch, SJ, PhD
  • by Daniel Ben-Ami