I agree wholeheartedly with Peter's article, and have long wondered about (worldwide) Aboriginal peoples' "hunting rights" when those rights do not include utilise enforced traditional methods. Dugongs (or Bow Whales, but then Inuit have a government imposed "bag limit") obviously have a far reduced chance of survival when hunted with a speedboat and rifles compared to spears and dugout canoes. This is so obvious, when talking about endangered species, that Peter's "illogical" tag for the Greens is most apt.

Does any major Australian political party have a Population policy, as opposed to an Immigration policy? In my view this continent and country is fast approaching, if not already exceeding, carrying capacity. It seems few politicians have the guts to suggest an upper limit on population.

RStuart,

I am sorry you cannot see how immigration-based population is necessary to increase local consumption in an export-orientated economy and thus reduce both the country's expenses and the global environmental impact at the same time. I honestly cannot explain it any simpler than I have done.

It is also unfortunate that you seem to be suggesting I was not proposing examples in the first instance. Perhaps if I repeat the quotation it will become clear that it was actually examples I was suggesting in the first instance: "I suspect you will discover that it is quite possible to have high economic wealth, high population density and a low ecological footprint." By stating that there are possible examples where 'x' is the case it also means that there will be examples where it is not the case.

At that point it is worth looking at issues like urban design and incentive structures.

Divergence,

Actually I'll admit my bias here. I like Peter Newman's work, probably because some twenty years ago I studied his course in Population, Resources and the Environment at Murdoch University and was the student representative on the Institute of Science and Technology Policy Board which he chaired. The particular interest in promoting mass transit seemed to be extremely sensible in the Australian context which suffers much from personal car dependence and urban blight appealed to me, especially living in the inner city region and travelling to what was then an outer suburb of Murdoch.

Contrary however to your claim, he is not a Town Planner, although he does make a great deal of use of planning knowledge. His PhD is in chemistry (UWA) and his post-doctoral studies are in environmental science (Delft).

You want people to reduce their use of water? Fine, have city planning which uses water resources more sensibly and charge more for it. Neither of us use are using the absolute biological minimum, so let's not pretend they are the figures are in actual use.

“I am sorry you cannot see how immigration-based population is necessary to increase local consumption in an export-orientated economy and thus reduce both the country's expenses and the global environmental impact at the same time.”

Lev, I cannot see it either.

What about this from my last post;

‘…while it might improve economies of scale for some resources if they are consumed close to their origin, continuous population growth places greater demand on those resources and all sorts of other resources. The demand for both domestic consumption and export income increases as the population grows. Higher domestic consumption doesn’t necessarily mean a lower rate of export. And for many resources, economies of scale are not improved by local consumption, because overseas consumers are often more frugal per capita and more efficient than us in their consumption of what we provide.’

Lev, "I am sorry you cannot see ...". What you are proposing would be remarkable if it were true. I actually would like it to be true, but remarkable claims require remarkable evidence. I don't find your explanations convincing, but in other threads you often provide links to background information and I was hoping you would do so in this case.

Bernie Masters, the idea of an "Ecological Footprint" is taken from other disciplines. Biologists often refer to the population density an environment can support, farmers often describe the quality of land in terms of its carrying capacity in animals per hectare. People have no trouble understanding these terms, and that makes it useful to apply to humans as well. I'll grant you its a dammed site more difficult to calculate for us humans right now because of rapidly changing technology, and because it is difficult to determine how much we depend on no-renewable resources - or at least will be depending on them they run out.

I was a bit surprised at your statement that "you'll see that, by all measures except energy the world is living within its finite constraints". That is not the case for fish stocks, for example. And as you point out it isn't the case for water. An recent article here on OLO pointed out we are running out of easily available phosphorous. Its clear by the end of this century it won't be the case for just about anything you care to name, as by then the population will of grown to 18 billion at current growth rates (1.2%).

It won't reach 18 billion of course. There is no way we can produce enough food for 18 billion people. So the problem will look after itself, or rather the four horseman and the apocalypse will look after it for us. This discussion is really about whether we want those nice horseman to look after it for us here in Australia, or if we think we can do a better job of it ourselves.

Ludwig, Rstuart,

Australia has a very strong export sector, more than a 1/5 of nominal GDP (Reserve Bank of Australia, "Trends in Australian Exports, 2002). The largest markets are Japan (1st), U.S.A. (2nd), with particular growth to China (3rd) and Korea (4th).

Our export items are usually primary products. Foodstuffs (especially meat and dairy), coal, petroleum, and metal ores, although there is some significant exports of road vehicles to the U.S. (and New Zeland) and, perhaps oddly, textiles to China.

Exporting such goods contributes significantly to our environmental impact. A kilogram of Australian meat consumed in Japan involves more environmental costs - and financial costs - than the same kilogram consumed in Melbourne.

Due to the reduced aggregate marginal propensity to consume such products, it is simply not possible for this environmental impact to be reduced without immigration. There is a local market for our fish, beef, dairy, grain cotton and so forth. However, our supply vastly exceeds local demand. (cf., Australia Now, DFAT, 2004-2005 figures). Two thirds of our beef is exported. Fifty percent of our dairy. Almost seventy-five percent of our seafood. Fourteen percent of the world's total wheat is provided by Australia. We're the world's largest supplier of wool... and so on.

What is your weekly demand for a kilo of wheat? How about two kilos? Five? Ten?

Now you're looking at the problem of trying to provide our vast supply to a limited local market with a marginal propensity to consume. There simply isn't the demand. There isn't enough people.

Either you place a ban on the production of our primary products, utterly destroying the lives of millions of Australians in the process, or you change the market.

I am not discounting the fact that extra immigration puts challenges to our local fixed natural resources. As I have said throughout this thread (and nobody has disputed), lowering our use of such resources is necessary and can be achieved through planning and incentive mechanisms. However, in our particular context one means to reduce our global enviromental impact is carefully selected increases in local population.

Lev,

The impact of shipping beef to Japan is trivial compared to the extra consumption of migrants in Australia, and it would be even less for commodities that do not require refrigeration.

Now about your suggestions for water. Your first is rationing by price. This would help to conceal the real shortage and shut up the richer people, who wouldn't even notice the extra costs. I think that they aren't doing it because the main determinant of how much water a household uses is the number of people and not the household income. A family with two babies in nappies or an incontinent elderly person can have the washing machine going all the time. There is also severe social inequality. In Finland, where they haven't been undercutting lower income people with population growth (and haven't noticed the dire effects you predict from not having it), the ratio between the share of income going to the top 10% of the population and that going to the bottom 10% is 5.7. It is 12.7 in Australia (figures from CIA World Factbook). There are public health implications if poor people can't afford enough water for proper hygiene.

As for forcing us down near the biological minimum, any politician who tried it would be lynched before he had to worry about being voted out. I don't think our elite is ready to peel off the veneer of democracy just yet. If we wanted migrants we would have to send out squads to kidnap them like North Korea.

Desalination is very expensive. Do you think the premiers would even be considering it if there were a cheap, easy solution?