Attenborough On Population

Is there anything more taboo than talking about population control in the environmental movement?

Even the most devout of environmentalists still continue to make babies, assured that their children will be different, less impactful than the other 6.77 billion people inhabiting the planet.

Population control advocates now have a new champion on their side. Sir David Attenborough, Britain's best-known natural history filmmaker, has recently become the patron of the Optimum Population Trust (OPT), the leading think tank in the UK concerned with the impact of population growth on the environment. He described the growth in human numbers as “frightening” and urged environmental organizations to spell out “loud and clear” the problems caused by population growth.

“I’ve seen wildlife under mounting human pressure all over the world and it’s not just from human economy or technology - behind every threat is the frightening explosion in human numbers,” explains Attenborough.“I’ve never seen a problem that wouldn’t be easier to solve with fewer people, or harder, and ultimately impossible, with more.”

"All serious environmentalists know perfectly well that population growth, exploding in the 20th century, has been a key driver of every environmental problem. It's a fact, not an opinion, that total human impact is the average per person multiplied by the number of people,” said Roger Martin, OPT chair. “Yet for far too long, governments and environmental NGOs have observed a taboo - invented in the 1980s by a bizarre coalition of the religious right and the liberal left - on stating this obvious fact. So they keep on implying that our numbers can grow forever with no ill effects.”

Sir David Attenborough, who was knighted in 1985, is a trustee of the British Museum and the Royal Botanic Gardens, and a fellow of the Royal Society. Sir Richard Attenborough, the actor and director, is his brother. 

Visit: http://www.optimumpopulation.org/