Hello. This is 6 Minute English
from BBC Learning English.
I'm Neil.
And I'm Sam.
We're talking about the environment
in this programme, specifically climate change.
Now, Sam, what do you think is
the biggest cause of climate change?
An obvious answer would be that
climate change is the result of
carbon emissions caused by humans.
It's about people's carbon footprint –
the measurement of how much carbon
dioxide is produced by someone's
everyday activities.
That makes sense.
But recently some
scientists, especially in the west,
have been focusing on another issue:
the increasing number of people
in the world, something known as
overpopulation.
In this programme,
we'll be discussing the controversial
link between overpopulation and
climate change.
And as usual
we'll be learning some new
vocabulary, as well.
Sounds good, Neil, but first I
have a question for you.
Over the last 100 years,
within one lifetime, the world's
population has soared.
At the
start of the 20th century,
it was around one-and-a-half billion,
but how many people are there
in the world today?
Is it:
a) seven billion?
b) eight billion?
or c) nine billion?
I'll say around eight
billion people live on the planet today.
OK, Neil, I'll reveal the
answer later in the programme.
Since climate change is caused
by human activities, it seems
common sense that fewer people
would mean lower carbon emissions.
But in fact the connection isn't
so simple.
Not everyone emits
carbon equally, and people in
the western world produce far
more than people in sub-Saharan
Africa or Asia.
Arvind Ravikumar is professor of
climate policy at the University
of Texas.
He's made the
surprising calculation that
an extra two billion people born
in low-consuming countries,
would actually add very little
to global carbon emissions.
Here, Kate Lamble and Neal Razzell,
presenters of BBC World Service programme,
The Climate Question, discuss
Professor Ravikumar's findings.
What he's saying is kind of
astonishing, right?
Two billion
people is, to say the least,
a lot.
It's the combined population
of Europe and Africa.
He's crunched the numbers and
found that an extra two billion
low-income people as defined by
the World Bank, these are people
without cars, without electricity
often, would see global emissions
rise by just 1.5%.
Add two billion high-income earners
- that's people with cars and
power and all the mod cons,
and Arvind reckons emissions
would rise by more than 60%.
So when it comes to climate change
and population, where you were
born matters.
Professor Ravikumar made his discovery
after crunching the numbers,
an idiom meaning performing many
mathematical calculations involving
large amounts of data.
He concluded that whereas two billion
low-income people would increase carbon
levels very little, two billion
high-income people would increase
it a lot.
That's because high-income
populations have mod cons, which is short
for 'modern conveniences': technology
and machines like cars, fridges
and air-conditioning that make life
easier and more pleasant.
According to this view, the
real problem is not overpopulation
but overconsumption.
Affluence – that's having
lots of money and owning many things,
has become a big factor in climate change,
and that's true in poorer countries
as well as richer ones.
Listen to Rajesh Joshi, reporter
for BBC World Service's, The Climate
Question, interviewing a rich
Indian housewife, Priti Dhagan,
in her luxurious home in New Delhi.
I need everything that I buy.
You cannot be judgmental about
anybody's needs, and I derive a
lot of happiness out of being very,
very drawn towards consumer things,
and I love it.
And I'm not
apologetic about it.
So if I tell you that poor
people have a smaller carbon
footprint as compared to their
richer counterparts, do you feel
apologetic about it?
So the brain says yes, we should
be apologetic about it, but the heart
does not agree.
Yes, poor can't
afford lots of stuff so their
carbon imprint is small, but here
my heart wins over my brain
because it gives me happiness.
Priti does not feel apologetic
about her shopping – she doesn't
think that she should feel sorry.
Shopping makes her happy and she
lets her heart rule her head –
an idiom meaning that you do
something based on emotions
rather than reason.
Priti is being very honest.
She is consuming and looking for
happiness in a way that people
in the west have been doing for decades.
It seems overconsumption is
a bigger cause of climate change
than raw population numbers.
Speaking of which...
what was
the answer to your question, Sam?
Ah yes, I asked about the
current global population.
You guessed it was around eight billion
people which was... the correct answer!
According to the United Nations,
the world's population reached eight
billion on November 15, 2022.
Right, let's recap the
vocabulary we've learned,
staring with carbon footprint –
a measurement of how much carbon
dioxide someone's activities produce.
If you crunch numbers, you perform
many mathematical calculations involving
large amounts of data.
Mod cons is short for 'modern conveniences'
- machines like cars, washing-machines,
and fridges which make life easier
and more pleasant.
Affluence means having lots
of money or material possessions.
If you are apologetic, you show
that you feel sorry for something
harmful you have said or done.
And finally, the idiom let your
heart rule your head means to do
something based on emotion and personal
desires rather than for logical or
practical reasons.
For now it's goodbye!
Bye bye!