Writing in Frontiers in Conservation Science, sixteen prominent conservationists and writers made a clarion call for scaling up nature and sizing down the human enterprise. Consider sharing these highlights with your friends and colleagues!
(Note: the quotes below are from the article, my headings are in bold. Links to supporting material for these statements are included in the full article.)
Allow nature to replenish the Earth
“Conservation would no longer be about sustaining a patchwork of natural areas or ‘islands’ within a human-dominated planet, an approach that does not halt extinctions. Instead, large-scale protected nature will govern Earth's systems, with a downsized humanity transformed into a sustainable subsystem. Choosing to protect and restore half the planet thus defines a new context for human inhabitation. Briefly put, we can conserve it all and designate ‘use’ areas, instead of the other way around.”
Have humanity be a part, not all, of the biosphere
“At a global level, economic activity and human numbers must be substantially downscaled. This will reduce humanity's collective pressures on Earth for food, land, freshwater, wild fish, bushmeat, energy, wood, minerals, and other materials. Economic degrowth and attaining a steady-state economy are critical components for downsizing the human factor, while moving toward a reduced human population will support lowering economic activity, including production, consumption, and trade. It is worth emphasizing that such a course correction toward downscaling the human enterprise can be justified even on purely anthropocentric grounds, given the dangers to humanity of heading deeper into ecological overshoot.”
Yes, bring down our numbers
“Why numbers matter with respect to impact on Earth's systems is evident in the socioeconomic trajectory of the human population. The global middle class (or consumer class) has been growing by hundreds of millions of people per decade since the 1990s… a total of 9–10 billion people—with electricity, disposable income, commodity possessions, and connection to a global economy—will have a much higher ecological footprint than a total of 2–4 billion people.
Population growth can end and numbers can be gradually lowered . Lowering human numbers is achievable within a human-rights framework…Among the rights that should become universal are accessible and affordable family-planning services; secondary education guaranteed for all girls and young women, and support systems for post-secondary school training; comprehensive sexuality education in school curricula; intolerance from the international community of ‘child brides;’ and women's economic rights to buy and inherit property, to borrow and bank money, and to own a business.
The United Nations has estimated a median population of 10.9 billion people by 2100. If the global community, however, achieved an average reduction of 0.5 births below the total fertility of the median scenario, the human population projected by century's end is 7.3 billion. Relatively small decreases in average family size result in substantially smaller total human numbers by 2100.”
Dispel human supremacy
“Non-humans possess justice-relevant qualities of agency, sentience, intelligence, dignity, and capacity for life's joys and tribulations. Advocating for inclusive justice—greater equality among people and respect for non-humans and their habitats—is corrective of an ethics that advocates for Earth as an open-access commons while implying that non-human species as less morally considerable. The strategy we propose—conserving upward of half the planet while scaling back human economic activity and numbers—moves us toward realizing inclusive justice.
We advocate that large-scale nature protection will bar corporate access from much of the natural world, preventing that sector from profiting at the expense of biodiversity and marginalized people.”
Mind what we eat, and how we produce it
“Food production constitutes the most extensive and destructive human economic system. Instead of food production claiming a disproportionate share of terrestrial, freshwater, and marine realms, we can revamp it into a modest subsystem of the planet. By promoting agroecological and low-impact production models, the landscapes and seascapes of food can be transformed to interface supportively with wild nature, sustain pollinators and other wildlife, build healthy soils, accommodate a reduced number of livestock, eschew synthetic pesticide and fertilizer pollutants, and take wild fish and other marine life with a lighter hand.
We also need to situate sources of ecologically and ethically produced food near human settlements (including cities) to ensure food security, lower food miles, reduce food waste, and preserve the nutritional value of food. To shrink the land, freshwater, and carbon “hoofprint” of food, humanity can turn to a mostly plant-based diet, a proclivity that younger generations are increasingly embracing. Last but not least, the hunting and handling of wild animals that have a high risk of disease transmission to humans should be strictly curbed, both for the conservation of wildlife and human safety.”
Advance social justice, indigenous rights, and a better way of life
“To achieve high levels of conservation, while avoiding unnecessary human hardship, it is crucial to partner with Indigenous and local communities near protected areas. Indigenous Peoples remain among the strongest defenders of Earth rights, and over one third of remaining natural lands are Indigenous lands. Conservation initiatives must respect Indigenous knowledge of the land, and collaborate with nearby communities to ensure they benefit from conservation actions…Communities need to be actively involved in conservation decision-making in ways that are context relevant, culturally sensitive, and attuned with Indigenous and local knowledge systems.
Proposed shifts for a sustainable economic life include shortening the workweek, shrinking production of superfluous products, reducing global trade, boosting local economies, lowering the production of animal-derived foods, making commodities that are durable and recyclable, and creating a culture of repairing and reusing material things. Chief consumer countries, and the global consumer class more broadly, must reduce consumption levels, especially of throwaway, luxury, and imported goods. Rich nations also need to lead the transition away from fossil-fuel-powered economies, and support the developing world by renewable energy transfer, forgiving debt, and investing funding (accrued from a wealth tax) into viable living conditions, healthcare, family-planning services, and education for all.”
This from ‘Problems, Predicaments and Technology’ blog seems to sum everything up neatly:
“"When will "we" unite to solve "our" global problems? As much as each of us may wish otherwise, humanity is not a giant family. It is a large mass of clever primates who have evolved to cope with temporary resource surpluses followed inevitably by scarcity. After the feast always comes the killing famine, and we are built to compete in just such a world.
This does not foreclose united action against common threats, but when the chips are down and *somebody* must have less of a limiting resource, we will do everything in our earthly power to ensure that it's not us.
The philosopher says, "Why are we busy scoring points off each other when we could unite to solve the problem?" The animal instinct replies, "The famine always comes; all individuals must die. What matters is the percentage of me and my clan's shared genetic material as a fraction of the surviving population's overall gene pool."
Good article but PLEASE replace the "staring owls" picture! That would be respectful of the many Indigenous Peoples who are brought up to never look into an owl's eyes. I was approvingly reading of "conservation attuned with Indigenous and local knowledge systems," when the owl picture scrolled into view and an instinctive shock went through my body! If you need confirmation, ask a Navaho, or ask Google: https://www.google.com/search?q=which+indigenous+peoples+are+superstitious+of+owls