In a world where the need for seafood and grain for the 90 million people being added each year is being satisfied in part by reducing consumption among those already here, the world has little choice but to try and quickly slow population growth. Historically, farmers and fishermen bore the primary responsibility for balancing supply and demand. Now with the fish catch no longer expanding and with the growth in grain production slowing, the principal responsibility rests with the family planners.

We have taken for granted seemingly endless supplies of water flowing from reservoirs wells, and diversion projects; access to water has been key to food security, industrialization, and the growth of cities. In this book from the Worldwatch Institute, Sandra Postel explains that decades of profligacy and mismanagement of the world's water resources have produced signs of shortages and environmental destruction. She writes with authority and clarity of the limits-ecological, economic, and political-of this vital natural resource. She explores the potential for conflict over water between...

With the exception of a few spectacular invasions, like the zebra mussel's conquest of the Great Lakes, there has been little public recognition of the dangers posed by these invading species. But exotic species are injuring our biological wealth on virtually every level -- from the genetic (when exotics interbreed with native species) to the wholesale transformation of landscapes Life Out of Bounds shows that this "biological pollution" is now beginning to corrode the world's economies as well. But the policy responses, on both the national and international levels, have usually...

Human demands are pressing up against more and more of the Earth's limits. This book from the Worldwatch Institute examines the impacts of population growth on global resources and services, including food, fresh water, fisheries, jobs, education, income, and health. Despite the current hype of a "birth dearth" in parts of Europe and Japan, the fact remains that human numbers are projected to increase by over 3 billion by 2050. Rapidly growing nations are likely to outstrip the carrying capacity of their natural support systems. Governments worn down by several decades of rapid population...