How population characteristics shape our world, and how we can influence them

Jennifer D. Sciubba, currently President and CEO of Population Reference Bureau, is a political demographer. She is a leading expert in how population trends and composition affect politics and social relations -- and vice versa. This is what makes her analysis more interesting than your run-of-the-mill books on demography. My own background was originally in population geography, so the fundamentals that Sciubba explains in the book are very familiar to me.

Beyond those fundamentals, there is a lot of interesting and insightful in the book. For example, Sciubba points out that neither rapid population growth nor aging are per se not inherently problematic. Instead, their impact depends on the governance, political and economic circumstances. While fertility has dropped to below replacement levles, resulting in population shrinkage without immigration in most parts of the world (including Europe, North America, Japan, China, even Brazil), it remains very high in most of Africa where the societies' ability to accommodate the large cohorts of new entrants into labor force are generally weak. Sub-Saharan Africa contines to be the place with the largest growth in population. Almost 90% of world's population growth until mid-century will take place in lower-middle and low-income countries. This will pose challenges in terms of political stability and pressures to migrate. Sciubba also points out that it is not to poorest people from the poorest countries who migrate, because migration requires a certain amount of financial resources as well as skills to navigate the complex challenges of international migration. This fact casts doubt on the oft-heard justification for foreign aid to help people where they are, so that they will be discouraged to move.

A feature that makes Sciubba's book a lively read is her ample use of historical and current examples to demonstrate the more technical or theoretical points. They range from the impacts of China's one-child policy to the Rwandan genocide; from the relationship between aging societies and peace, to implications of Nigeria's youthful population. (I have to point out an odd slip: At one point, Sciubba places the southern African country of Botswana in the Sahel.)

Although Sciubba mentions climate change in several places, as acting as a stressor and as a driver of migration, it features fairly little in the book. That of course could be the focus of a separate book in itself.

A worthwhile and entertaining read, I'd recommend this book to anyone interesting in how population trends, fertility, mortality and migration shape society all over the world.

People on the move - Coping with immigration

 Immigration was the central issue for one in seven of (likely) voters in the US presidential election of 2024, second only to inflation and high prices, and played a decisive role for many people in deciding whom to vote for.

Likewise in Europe, immigration has dominated much of the public discourse over the past years. Immigration from outside to the European Union (EU) and the United States has increased significantly over the past several decades. In the US, there are now 46.2 million foreign-born persons (yours truly included) or about 13.9% of the total population. In the EU, 42.4 million people, or 9% of the population, were born outside of the Union’s borders. Whether the share of immigrants in Western countries is high or low is open for debate—and it has indeed dominated public discourse almost everywhere.

A 2022 Eurobarometer survey found that almost seven out of ten Europeans overestimate the share of immigrants in their countries. Furthermore, the largest source countries for immigrants tend to be elsewhere in Europe and what we broadly call the West, the list topped by Switzerland, Australia, Iceland, Israel, Norway, the US, and Turkey (Türkiye).

Japan is still an exception among the rich and ageing countries of the Global West. While it maintains its more restrictive immigration policy, the number of foreigners there, too, has grown significantly. According to the Ministry of Justice, there were 2.76 million foreigners living in Japan in 2022 (excluding those there illegally and long-staying tourists) constituting about 2.3% of the total population.

The largest groups of immigrants to Japan come from other Asian countries—China, Korea, Vietnam and the Philippines—as well as Brazil, which has a significant population of ethnic Japanese (with about half a million Japanese residing in and around São Paulo). These same are among the top source countries in the US as well. Following Mexico, the largest groups of immigrants to the States come from India, China, Philippines and Vietnam.

Attitudes towards foreigners vary significantly depending on the kind of migrant and how they arrived in the destination countries. To put it bluntly, few EU citizens are upset about the Swiss or the Norwegians living amongst them (some are more critical of the Americans, although those who want to live in Europe tend to be less provincial in outlook than their average compatriots).

Most of the debate on immigration is concerned with immigrants from poor and conflict-affected countries, and is driven by fears that the importation of cheap unskilled labor from the Global South will undercut salaries and take away jobs in general. There is some truth to this argument: the availability of ample labor for low-paying jobs can reduce the pressure on employers to increase pay in step with rising prices.

However, immigrants often do jobs that natives in rich countries would not take, including in agriculture and the numerous restaurant kitchens everywhere around us.  Without immigrants from Mexico, elsewhere in Central America, and China, consumer prices in the US would certainly go up and many fields would suffer from labor shortages.

Another complaint pertains to social and cultural issues. Some immigrants are seen as holding on to their old ways and often not integrating into their new host countries. In this respect, the US has a better track record than Europe, which has suffered several (and increasing) terrorist attacks by foreigners, several of whom have arrived among legitimate refugees.

Issues such as women’s rights, domestic violence (even honor killings), female genital mutilation, and other persistent features appall the Western hosts. Incoming President Trump has famously fanned the flames of fear of immigrants, claiming i.a. that Mexican immigrants to the US are rapists and murderers, and that immigrants from Haiti eat the pets of Americans. There is no evidence of this and, in fact, native-born Americans are more likely to commit crimes than immigrants.

The issue of illegal immigration is obviously a complicated one. The “crisis on the southern border” was a major theme in the 2024 US election, which concerned Americans of all races and walks of life. Even people who feel positively towards immigration (after all, the country was built upon immigration) tend to think that the situation is out of control and that it would be important to have an orderly process.

Many immigrants who have come to the country through a legal route also see it as unfair that you can enter the country just by showing up at a border post, declaring yourself a refugee facing persecution at home; then get in to wait for their case to pass through the legal process (which takes years) and in the meantime disappear into the country and find illegal work.

The economics of immigration are clear. Immigration overall is correlated with increased productivity and long-term economic development. Multiculturalism also tends to be associated with a richer tapestry of life. No-one can seriously argue that the cuisine of the USA, UK, Germany or Finland has not improved thanks to foreigners coming to live in our countries. However, it is equally clear that extremely rapid movement of people can be disruptive and irrevocably change the nature of communities.

There are also great differences between different groups of immigrants. At one end you have the highly educated professionals, including those who arrived for higher education, who tend to integrate and quickly enrich their new home countries. In the US, where according to the Census Bureau the current median household income is about $80,000 per year, this figure is over $112,000 for Asians, as compared with $85,000 for whites, $65,000 for Hispanics, $61,000 for Native Americans (including Alaskans), and $57,000 for Blacks. The Indian, Persian, Chinese, Japanese and other Asian doctors, engineers and other professionals clearly are doing well in America. It’s also worth noting that immigrants from Nigeria and elsewhere in West Africa are on the average earning more than Americans, including whites.

Which brings us to the differing policies between countries. Canada is well known for its system where higher education and wealth bring points to potential immigrants to move up the queue. Japan has also opened its doors to highly educated foreigners who can help the country stay at the forefront of advanced research: When you enter the campus of any top research university in the country you can’t avoid seeing many un-Japanese faces, mostly from India and elsewhere in South Asia.

In the USA, there are currently more than 1.5 million foreign students (the top countries being India, China and South Korea) and they tend towards STEM majors, such as computer and information sciences and engineering, as well as management. They also dominate graduate studies in STEM subjects. Without them, science and technological development in the US would be far less innovative.

People have always been on the move and, on the whole, this has enriched our lives. What some people these days lament as cultural appropriation has always been the norm. That’s how societies learn and develop. There is no country in the world that has not taken bits and pieces of other nations’ cultures and made them their own.

We now live in a world where, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), a UN body, more than 280 million people—or 3.6% of the world's population—are on the move.

People move for a variety of reasons. Many move in search of a better life and economic opportunities. These two are not necessarily the same, as for many migrant workers better economic opportunities may bring current hardships and dangers. For instance, South Asian and Filippino workers in the Gulf have little recourse against abuses by employers. Still, this does not deter migrant workers: there were 169 million of them in 2019 according to IOM. These migrants and diaspora communities sent $647 billion back to their home countries in 2022, far outpacing any official development assistance these countries receive.

Many people do not move voluntarily. The UN’s refugee organization tells that there were 82.4 million forcibly displaced persons in 2020, including 26.4 million officially recognized refugees. These are people who have fled persecution, armed conflict, or human rights violations in their home areas. Most of them are internally displaced or in neighboring countries, but many of them are also spread around the world. A new category, not yet fully recognized in international law, are the environmental or climate refugees whose livelihoods have been affected by environmental degradation, droughts and other environmental hazards (more on that in a later blog).

People from both categories—economic migrants and refugees—frequently try their luck to get into the more peaceful countries of Europe, North America and Australia. Legally or illegally.

Complicating the problem is that it is rarely the poorest people who migrate. The increase in migration during the past decades has coincided with increased incomes and standards of living in the emigrants’ home countries. Despite this, the wealth differences between countries drive people to seek their luck in richer countries of the world—and who can blame them for that? It does, nevertheless, contradict the often-heard claim that increased development assistance in the departure countries would reduce pressure to emigrate.

Our views of how we should deal with our fellow humans on the move vary considerably. At one end are those who long for a borderless world, like it was hundreds of years ago when you could just walk or ride a camel or sail to a new land and settle there (sometimes replacing or subordinating those already living there). One of them is Gaia Vince, who in her well researched but partial book, Nomad Century, argues for the abolishment of national borders for both moral and economic reasons.

Vince doesn’t seem to see any downsides to accepting an unlimited number of new entrants to any country. She goes as far as to suggest that Swedish policy-makers fear nothing more than the departure of immigrants from the country. Such Pollyannish views would hardly fly with the people of Sweden where foreign gangs (many hailing from North Africa or former Yugoslavia) have turned the peaceful “people’s home” (folkhemmet) into a killing field (unlike in America, it is the foreigners who are driving violent crime in Scandinavia).

At the other end are those who want to keep all foreigners out. We find them everywhere: in Japan where some right-wing nationalists see gaijin corrupting the country; in Finland where violent events involving immigrants have hardened the public attitudes; and in the USA where president-elect Trump has promised to round up and deport 11 million undocumented people living illegally in the country. An analysis by the Peterson Institute for International Economics suggests that this effort would drive up inflation and shrink the US economy, targeting workers in areas where they will be hard to replace. (Not to mention the logistical challenge and cost of actually rounding up and deporting millions of people.)

Understandably, immigration brings out strong emotions and divides people and communities. Although its impacts can be net-positive, there are many factors that influence the balance. One of them is the speed of the process, which can overwhelm communities. The other is the facility of integration of immigrants into their new environments, which requires effort from both sides.

While multiculturalism can be a richness, the long-term inhabitants in a place have a right to maintain their social norms. We need an immigration policy that is both humane towards the people who need refuge, as well as orderly and fair; one that also takes into account what different types of immigrants can contribute to their new country.

[Published originally at: https://juhauitto.substack.com/p/people-on-the-move-coping-with-immigration] 

A Planet of 3 Billion: Mapping Humanity's Long History of Ecological Destruction and Finding Our Way to a Resilient Future | A Global Citizen's Guide to Saving the Planet by Christopher Kevin Tucker

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This is a very important and sobering book that I wish everyone would read. Chrisopher Tucker, a self-described unrepentant capitalist, tackles the fundamental issue affecting the sustainability of the planet: human population. He clearly states his thesis: the Earth has a people problem.

There was a time half a century ago when ecologically-minded scientists, researchers and activists actively discussed the impossibility of unlimited population growth on a limited planet. It was inevitable that the population bomb would explode. This rational view was silenced from all sides. The conservative and often religious right was attacking it for promoting “unnatural” things, such as population control. It didn’t help that China (and earlier India) established draconian measures to curb population growth. The left saw it as blaming the victim: one should not try to interfere with poor people’s right to have children. The developing countries saw it as a white man’s ploy to keep them down, while at the same time many saw a burgeoning population as might that could help them to dominate their neighbors. And economists – those eternal optimists to whom growth of any kind is a value in itself and who see any negative aspect of growth as mere externalities that can be left out of the equation – put their money on human ingenuity and technology that would overcome any obstacle (this has so far worked to the extent that material lack has decreased, but at a huge cost to the natural environment). No-one paid any attention to the rights of non-humans on this planet, or even the quality of life or joy that nature would bring people. If you can’t measure it in money, it does not exist. Finally, Christopher Tucker has brought human overpopulation back into focus.

Tucker makes it clear that his is not a neo-Malthusian oeuvre and he recognizes the essential roles the level of per capita consumption and technology play. But his thorough and thoughtful analysis leads him to the conclusion that the Earth can sustainably support only a population of 3 billion – and that only if we cut out ecological footprint and waste significantly. He takes issue with the romantic view that pre-industrial people lived in harmony with nature. It was only because their numbers were so small that the damage they did was limited, but damage they did do by clearing land for agriculture, by cutting down forests for construction, energy and fiber, by hunting wild animals and grazing domesticated ones. Sahara once was a viable ecosystem until overuse of its fragile ecosystem turned it into a desert. Since Roman times, people fundamentally transformed Europe’s ecosystems. In ecological terms, humans are an invasive species.

The first half of the book provides a detailed overview of the Earth’s environmental history in light of human impact on it through population growth, industrialization, agriculture, development of new energy sources (notably fossil fuels whose introduction initially saved forest that were being cut down for energy, but which has later led to air pollution and climate change), infrastructure, transportation, urbanization, introduction of toxic chemicals, waste etc. He takes popular environmental theories and critiques them. A geographer by training, one of Tucker’s main contributions pertains to the insights into the geographical diversity of the world. Hardly anyone else has addressed this issue systematically. E.O. Wilson has proposed that half of the world should be set aside for nature, but Tucker reveals how challenging and complex this notion is. What do we mean by half when every geography is so different in terms of productivity, terrain, topography, climate and so forth, and when connections between regions are essential? Measuring half just by size is meaningless. And what do we mean by “protection” anyway? He suggests viewing the world through the perspective of ecoregions.

He embraces the ecological footprint thesis, but critiques it for also lacking a geographical perspective, which he convincingly inserts into it, while recognizing the enormous technical task of incorporating the geographical variables into the equation.

The book is a delightful exception to the current debate where climate change crowds out all other environmental issues (are we really only able to focus on one thing at a time?). Tucker doesn’t belittle the impacts of climate change, but hammers home the point how humanity is causing irreversible harm to the Earth’s ecosystems through so many other ways. One example is waste. We generate astronomical amounts of waste that fill the land, atmosphere and, not least, oceans – and have very few solutions to the issue. He also brings to attention forms of pollution that we seldom think of, such as noise pollution that is very hazardous to many animals from birds to whales.

The book contains some hopeful examples of how things may be changing. Circular economy where the waste of one process becomes an input to the next is one. He highlights Finland’s commitment to zero waste, including greenhouse gas emissions. Despite the acknowledgement of the need and good intentions, this is still difficult work in progress. I fully agree with Tucker that well managed cities are the only way of containing human impact on the planet, as sprawl is one of worst kinds of destruction as areas are transformed into artificial ones, roads dissect ecosystems. Lawns and parks may be green, but they are far from natural and only contain a fraction of natural biodiversity. Living densely reduces the geographic footprint and minimizes the need for movement. There are increasing examples of sustainable cities, such as Singapore (and the organization I work for, the Global Environment Facility, is one of the many that actively promotes sustainable urbanization), but too many cities, especially in the developing countries, are growing haphazardly wreaking havoc both on their human inhabitants and nature.

Agriculture is one of the biggest contributors to environmental change. Techniques such as vertical farming could significantly reduce the impact. Admittedly, it would be much harder to develop for animal husbandry. Growing meat for human consumption is extremely wasteful in terms of land, water and waste. The figures are stunning: there are 1.4 billion cattle, 2 billion domesticated pigs, 1 billion sheep, 450 million goats and 19 billion chicken on Earth (p. 229). Their only purpose is to feed people.

Through a sophisticated and convincing analysis – with transparent assumptions – Tucker concludes that the Earth’s carrying capacity of human population is around 3 billion people. This is a stark prospect, given that there currently are about 7.5 billion of us on the planet and the UN projects that the population will grow to at least 9 billion before it reaches its peak. However, it’s illustrative to remember that it was after World War II when the world population still was at that lower level. Since then, our lives and lifestyles have also changed dramatically. Today there are some 3 billion air passengers annually; more than there were people in 1950.

Tucker recognizes that bringing world’s population down to 3 billion will not be easy. He discusses the obstacles to this, including cultural and religious norms and, not least, classical economics that still believes that the alternative to eternal growth it stagnation. Even the field of environmental economics doesn’t go far enough, believing that a steady-state can be reached. We also often witness hand-wringing because of aging populations and population decline, especially in Japan and Western Europe. However, irrespective of what we wish, the world population will start shrinking at around year 2100, unless an ecological disaster catches us before that (it could also be a global pandemic – such as the current outbreak of coronavirus – that does us in). Sooner or later we will have to learn to live with a declining population. Tucker calls for a new generation of economists to focus efforts on de-growth economics. There is no law of nature that compels that our standard of living and quality of life should decline should growth stop (on the contrary, I would argue).

In the end, Tucker is cautiously optimistic, trusting that new ways of thinking and technologies will save humankind before it is too late. He rightly points out that either we start making these radical changes in society now or we will be forced to make much more unpleasant choices a bit later. He outlines an agenda – a cookbook, he calls it – for global leaders and global citizens that encompasses ten necessary areas of action to avoid catastrophe: 1) women’s empowerment that will lead to smaller families; 2) building sustainable, smart and resilient cities; 3) developing restoration and rewilding strategies for each ecoregion; 4) de-industrializing and reducing human footprint in critical ecoregions; 5) driving wastes out of capitalist supply chains; 6) demanding the design of low-impact infrastructure; 7) stopping impeding and diverting the natural flow of water; 8) stopping use of “growth” language in economic strategies and economic development planning; 9) reframing eco-engineering to focus on unwinding the most egregious ecological offenses; and 10) thinking critically about how the land rights model of capitalism has led to the denuding the planet and identifying alternatives that help strike a balance between human development and the ecological processes on which humankind depends.

Tucker discusses further each of these and how they might be advanced. Responsibility is given to governments and especially business leaders, as well as us individuals. We can influence matters globally through our actions by changing our individual behaviors (given the enormous role of cattle ranching in converting natural landscapes to pastures, depleting water resources, wasting resources as feed and producing greenhouse gases, reducing meat consumption is an obvious way to reduce one’s ecological footprint). Still, it seems to me unreasonable to expect all humans on the planet – especially as the majority are still lagging far behind the West – to bear the brunt of the responsibility, when it really is the system that is built on growth and waste and exploitation that needs to be changed.

When reading Tucker’s solutions, nevertheless, they appear doable from a technical point of view and there would be millions of people in the world who would agree to pursue these rigorously. But are they enough? It is hard to believe so, when one follows the political debate in the United States, the wealthiest and most powerful nation that also has the world’s largest ecological footprint per capita (then again, Chris Tucker is American, too, and his ideas certainly are bold). Similarly, in most developing countries getting rich is the greatest goal for everyone. Furthermore, developing countries are the place where future population growth will take place (mostly in Africa). The renowned environmentalist Gus Speth has summarized the situation succinctly: “I used to think the top environmental problems were biodiversity loss, ecosystem collapse and climate change. I thought that with 30 years of good science we could address those problems. But I was wrong. The top environmental problems are selfishness, greed and apathy … and to deal with those we need a spiritual and cultural transformation – and we scientists don’t know how to do that.”

Christopher Tucker ends his book with an Epilogue for Planetary Ethics, He provides a pointed critique of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as ambitious but a result of complex political compromises. He points out that there is gaping inconsistency between the socioeconomic development goals and the environmental sustainability goals (a fact that I, too, have pointed out in several of my writings and presentations) and population is entirely outside of the discussion (p. 251). In the end, he frames the need for a transformation in ethical terms. This is one of the best written and strongest chapters – and certain to offend some people. Tucker confronts head-on the issue that, if everyone recognizes the problem of overpopulation and the threats it poses to the global sustainability, the debate turns quickly to equity, because the world population and population growth are not equally distributed on the planet. “If humans, collectively, are doing harm to the planet who should have to sacrifice or undertake disproportionate effort to rectify the situation”, he asks (p. 253). One thing that Tucker does not consider adequately in the book is international migration that is already reshaping the world, driven by inequality, conflict and climate change.

It is also very refreshing that he calls a spade a spade when it comes to people’s cognitive abilities and psychologies. He recognizes that there is a minority of people who are not able to grasp the big picture. Then there are those who are ignorant, but more importantly the large portion of people – including many with a will to power – who are willfully ignorant, as they understand that acting on what they know would be against their own short-term interests. In the end, it is often difficult to differentiate the actions of the willfully ignorant (or outright evil) from those of the simply stupid.

The book also contains four open letters to arguably the most powerful individuals on the planet: the Pope, Jeff Bezos, Bill and Melinda Gates, and Xi Jinping.

The book is well illustrated with maps, data and graphs, which are also accessible through the website.

All in all, A Planet for 3 Billion is bound to annoy many people who do not (or more likely do not want to) believe the situation being that dire, who are reluctant to change their ways or who just think it all alarmist and unrealistic to achieve such a transformation. We’ll be alright as long as we don’t think about it. However, a fundamental change will be necessary one way or another (to paraphrase how kids used to threaten each other on schoolyard in my youth: you change now – or you cry and change!). Thinkers and activists such as the author are needed. But perhaps our best hope lies with visionary entrepreneurs who see not only the necessity but also opportunities for themselves in moving us towards a more sustainable future. There is also hope in young people who are increasingly aware of the destruction we place on our only home planet and who also have the most to lose.




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Sandy Weather in Beijing

When I returned to Beijing on a late March evening, the sandstorms had subsided but one could still taste the dust particles in the air. The night was moonless and there was a slight haze. The meteorological authorities had recommended that residents stay inside as much as possible and keep their windows closed. Inhaling too much of the dust would have negative health effects, especially on respiratory organs.

The worst sandstorm of the year hit Beijing on a Saturday. It was the 20th of March 2010. On the following Monday, a second storm enveloped the capital city in a shroud of yellow dust that covered everything from the rooftops to the pavement on the streets. Trees as well as cars were coated by a layer of sandy dust. As an immediate result, dust pollution in the air rose to intolerable levels. People on the streets wore facemasks to protect their mouths and noses. Pharmacies were reportedly selling these items in ten times larger quantities than during normal times. Patients with asthma and other respiratory illnesses flooded the hospitals. Schools banned outdoors sports and even class breaks in the school yard.

Despite these dramatic consequences, the sandstorms were by no means unique in Beijing or elsewhere in China. In fact, according to the Chinese National Meteorological Centre, there have been on the average eight to nine sandstorms in Beijing each year over the past decade. Four-fifths of them occur in the spring.

The news reported that sandstorms over the weekend affected some 270 million people in 16 Chinese provinces covering an area of 2 million square kilometres. The numbers are staggering, but so is the scale of these storms. Fuelled by high winds from the north, the storms affected not only the capital region and the provinces north from it—Shaanxi, Hebei and Shanxi—but reached far south to the coast. Reportedly, the touristic city of Hangzhou—known as the most beautiful in China—in Zheijiang province in the east, and Fujian province on the southeast coast of the country were blanketed in yellow dust. As far south as Hong Kong, air pollution levels caused by the dust shot through the roof. Not even the island of Taiwan was spared: the dust pollution index in the capital of Taipei doubled.

In an interview with the China Daily on 23 March 2010, Duan Li, chief weather forecaster with the Beijing Meteorological Bureau, explained that, strictly speaking, rather than a sandstorm, we had just experienced a mere dust storm. The word ‘sandstorm’ is used when visibility falls to less than 1 km, she clarified, while this time visibility averaged between 2-3 km. Whatever the definition, the Beijing municipal Environmental Protection Bureau reported that the air quality was promptly deteriorating due to the dust and the city was experiencing level-four air pollution.

The perennial sandstorms plaguing the city originate in the northern parts of the country, often in the vast dry open areas of Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang and Tibet. A perfect sandstorm is created when cold Siberian winds from the northwest meet with soil that has been dried by the warming spring weather. The high wind velocity associated with the winter monsoon can reach 18-28 metres per second. Historically, strong winds occur for about a month every year but in rare cases they can last for up to a hundred days. Often the windiest days coincide with the dry season when sandstorms develop and blow away the dry loose surface soil. This time the epicentre of the sandstorm was located in the Inner Mongolia and Ningxia Hui autonomous regions.

Needless to say, the sandstorms are frequently seen as yet another consequence of human mismanagement of nature. Surely this must be yet one manifestation of how the greed of the contemporary man destroys the very base on which our lives depend? Undoubtedly, overgrazing of animals and deforestation in these naturally arid lands has caused significant erosion and loosened the topsoil that can now be blown away by the winds. Urbanization that these traditionally pastoralist societies are facing has put additional pressures on the natural vegetation that holds the soil together. The grasslands of northern China have been significantly degraded and deserts now cover 16 percent of the country. No-one can deny these facts.

But is this a new phenomenon? And is it particularly related to the exceedingly rapid economic growth and modernization of China over the past couple of decades? It would seem safe to argue, no, on the contrary, grassland degradation and drought have plagued northern China for centuries. My Beijing–based friend John explained how Chang’an, the former eastern terminus of the legendary Silk Road in Shaanxi province, collapsed in the 10th century C.E., partly due to environmental stresses on land and water caused by the large settlement. Sandstorms must have been a nuisance already then, more than a thousand years ago.

It is easy to blame recent developments for environmental degradation and the current trajectory may indeed not be sustainable. However, people’s memories are short and many environmentally concerned folks are intuitively sceptical about economic development. Yet, the history of degradation is often much longer and in some cases economic development has actually helped halt environmental damage as local people’s awareness and possibilities to invest in environmental protection improved. This has been convincingly shown by Jack Ives and Bruno Messerli in their now classic 1989 volume The Himalayan Dilemma: Reconciling Development and Conservation in which the two geographers show that, based on a historical record, the deforestation and land degradation in the world’s highest mountain range goes back hundreds of years and was largely due to colonial policies. According to their research, the intensive smallholder terraced agriculture has actually resulted in the stabilization of the slopes.

A similar storyline emerges from the book The Ordos Plateau of China: An Endangered Environment by another geographer and friend, Hong Jiang at the University of Hawaii. Ordos Plateau in the Inner Mongolia autonomous region is a fragile environment that is easily impacted by human activities, be it animal grazing, agriculture or construction. Subjected to overgrazing and deforestation, the flat open land becomes increasingly exposed to wind erosion that can have disastrous proportions. However, Hong’s detailed historical and field research demonstrates that the most rampant degradation in the region occurred during the first three decades after the takeover by Mao’s revolutionary guard in 1949. During this period that included the 'Great Leap Forward' (read: the opposite), the Chinese masses were mobilized to conquer the nature for the benefit of the new communist state. Since 1978, the degradation started slowing down and has in some areas even been reversed after environmental protection efforts were put in place.

Human factors were the triggering forces for environmental degradation, as well as the determining forces for environmental improvement, she concludes. Government policies played the most important role both in initially leading to the runaway degradation and, later, its reversal. Such policies were more important in determining the environmental outcomes than other factors, including economic growth, population increase and social practices.

With wealth often comes a raised awareness of the importance of environmental quality and an ability to do something about it. The Beijing-based Global Times reported that the Tibetan authorities have pledged to improve close to a million hectares of desert areas over the coming two decades by planting trees and grass. Similarly, according to China Daily, Beijing and its port city Tianjin have invested 4 billion yuan (more than 500 million dollars) into wind and sandstorm control since 2000.

Then again, the prominent ecologist Jiang Gaoming of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has pointed out that tree-planting projects in north China have been in existence for three decades and 60 billion yuan has been spent on preventing the sandstorms, but the results have not been impressive. To the question why this is the case, Jiang provides a set of answers that combine the technical (planting grass rather than trees; need to include remote, inaccessible areas that are ecologically degraded) and the social. His point is that many of these formerly nomadic areas in the northwest just are too fragile for permanent settlement and their carrying capacities have been exceeded by the current population levels (just as they were towards the end of the glory of Chang'an). Furthermore, there is a link to poverty, as poor people rely on the grasslands to feed their livestock and clear land for their crops.

But for now the dust had settled and I was able to enjoy a pleasant lunch in a courtyard of an old hutong converted into a trendy café near the Lama Temple just two days after the second sandstorm. The sky was blue and breathing the air was no problem. Still, another eight to ten sandstorms are expected to hit northern China between April and May this year. Zhang Peiqun, chief forecaster at the National Meteorological Centre, explained in the newspaper that this could be predicted due to the fluctuation between warm spring weather and sudden cold spells causing heavy winds to blow away the dry sand. We got a demonstration of the sudden variability of the weather the same evening when wet snow like white rags was pouring from the sky and everything was momentarily covered in sleet.

Like everywhere, springtime weather in Beijing is unpredictable. What is sure, however, is that the sandstorms will recur for the foreseeable future.

House of Peace (Still)

Dar es Salaam was like a breath of fresh air after Nairobi. Literally, as a breeze blew from the ocean. There were tree-lined boulevards and the traffic was completely tolerable. The Indian Ocean coastal city whose name translates into ‘House of Peace’ from the onset appeared to live up to its meaning. The harbour was protected from the worst outbursts of the sea by being secluded in the middle of the city, surrounded by land from all sides with just a narrow opening to the open water. I was staying with a less aptly named Harbour View Hotel that could only boast a sea view from a handful of rooms on the upper floors. I didn’t really mind, as my room was otherwise more than adequate (never mind the pigeon nest partly blocking my non-harbour view) and the walk to the seaside was rather brief.

On our first afternoon in the city, my travel companion Jed and I went for a long walk on the waterfront. At the pier where the ferries for Zanzibar departed, we were immediate accosted by persistent men who tried to sell us a boat trip to the island. We were only left in peace when we explained that this was our first day in town and that we couldn’t possibly travel immediately again. With the phone number of the most insistent tour promoter in hand, we left the port area. Jed would use their services some days later on a trip to the island. This afternoon we strolled on the lively but not too crowded Sokoine Drive, then up to Kivukoni Road and on to Ocean Road. The traffic was sparse and the sidewalks clean. Well-dressed ladies in colourful African dresses mingled with equally fashionably, but less colourfully dressed Muslim women with their heads demurely covered with scarves. A shoe salesman had spread his selection on the broad pavement in the shade of trees. In front of a white Christian church a choir was singing joyous gospel hymns.

A traditional felucca with its white sails contrasting against the blue sky was silently heading towards the ocean. Seeing the boat I fantasized of the fabled days maybe five centuries ago when Arab and South Asian traders prowled the coast of what is today Tanzania. What a cosmopolitan mix it must have been in the trading posts at that time, where a huge variety of wares, fish, spices and other things were traded. That was the time when Swahili, the lingua franca of most of East Africa, also developed, as the Arabic traders mixed with the native Bantu populations. Indian Ocean has almost a mystic glamour to me.

We entered into the fish market that was almost closing for the day. There were still many fishermen and women selling the morning’s catch of octopi and sleek silvery fish, although their supplies were getting depleted. On the beach behind the market, fishing folks were taking care of their nets and boats, while children were playing in the shallow water.

Further north, in front of the huge grounds of the presidential palace, the strand was wide between the thinly trafficked road and the sea. People were strolling leisurely or lingering in the late Sunday afternoon sun. A family with a child strapped with African cloth to the mother’s back; young couples holding hands exchanging glances; an elderly man with a white Muslim cap on his head sitting on a boulder contemplating the vastness of the ocean. The afternoon mood was tranquil and beautiful.

Unlike in most large cities on the continent, a walk through Dar es Salaam is not to invite trouble. Even two muzungus as clearly from out of town as we were are mostly left alone, except for the few eager trip salesmen around the pier. Not for a single moment did we feel insecure, let alone threatened. Even in the evening after dark when we would walk along Samora Machel Road to find a restaurant to eat dinner we felt no danger, despite the fact that even in the city centre the streets at night are dark and quite deserted.

Amidst all the bad news from Africa, Tanzania seldom grabs international attention. In Tanzania’s case, no news is indeed good news. The country has lived peacefully and rather harmoniously for the decades since its independence. It is a place where people of different cultural and religious backgrounds mingle peacefully. The name itself implies an amalgamation of two separate countries and cultures: Tanganyika and Zanzibar. Tanganyika, before the war a part of the German East Africa, then a British colony, gained independence in 1961 under the leadership of Julius Nyerere. Even the independence struggle was quite peaceful and the transfer of power uneventful compared with, say, neighbouring Kenya. The island of Zanzibar off the coast had in turn been ruled by Arabs for centuries. They had sailed there from Oman with the assistance of the monsoon winds. It too became a British colony but there the overthrow of the colonialists in 1963 was more sudden and not quite as peaceful. That story is told brilliantly by Ryszard Kapuściński who was among the handful of foreign correspondents to reach the island just days after the coup by Abeid Karume, the leader of Zanzibar’s Afro-Shirazi Party representing the black African population on the island. The two newly independent nations merged in 1964 to form the United Republic of Tanganyika and Zanzibar.

Nyerere became the long-term president and TANU (Tanganyika African National Union), the party he had formed in 1954 to oppose the Brits, would be the only one in the country until the mid-1980s. The president was known as Mwalimu or teacher in Swahili, his profession before turning fulltime into politics. A modest man who avoided the excesses of many of the other leaders on the continent, Nyerere made turning Tanzania into a socialist paradise as his priority. For its well-meaning socialist policies, the country became the favourite of ‘progressive’ donor countries, such as the Scandinavians. Taxpayers in the Nordic countries chipped in when Mwalimu launched his disastrous Ujamaa policies. The goal of Ujamaa—‘Familyhood’—was to collectivize farming and to bring about benefits to the community from rounding up the farmers into planned villages. Many a Northern socialist thought this a great idea.

In fact, Nyerere’s worldview had been strongly influenced by Mao’s Cultural Revolution in China. Tanzania sought the support of China, which willingly complied. Luckily while the teacher modelled his nation accordingly, the policies were implemented somewhat half-heartedly. Traditional villages were systematically destroyed and people were herded into the brave new planned settlements. Thousands perished, of course, but Ujamaa never resulted in quite such terror as the Cultural Revolution or mass starvation like another one of Mao’s lunacies, the ‘Great Leap Forward,’ had done in China. Yet, the collective economics continued in Tanzania much after China had abandoned its most extreme social experiments and decided that getting rich was actually glorious. The Tanzanians were to wear Mao-inspired safari suits long after the Chinese themselves has switched to dark business suits and designer silk ties.

The decades of socialist experimentation did impoverish this beautiful nation, rich in natural resources. According to the United Nations Development Programme, Tanzania ranks 159th in human development out of the 177 countries ranked. Almost 90 percent of its population lives with less than US$2 per day. Tanzania possesses huge wealth by way of gold, diamonds, platinum, uranium, coltan and many other precious minerals. Tanzanite is a precious stone that has only been found in Tanzania and has a higher price by carat than diamonds. The problem is that Tanzania has not been able to develop any industry and all of its valuable raw materials are shipped out in their unprocessed form providing the value added to foreigners from South Africa, Europe and North America.

Another, obvious, source of wealth in Tanzania is its fabulous nature, which holds enormous potential for tourism. Kilimanjaro that rises close to 5,900 metres above the sea level is the highest mountain on the African continent. Its snowy cap shines bright white above the surrounding savannah beckoning climbers from all over the world. World famous game parks like Serengeti with their still abundant wildlife, including lions, giraffes, elephants and other large animals, are also in Tanzanian territory. The crater of Ngorongoro is unique on earth with its stupendous landscape and animal wealth. In 2000 when I was in Serengeti I could observe the different levels of accommodations that had been put up for the safari tourists. Some of them were truly upscale catering to the wealthy foreigners who want to experience their wildlife watching without having to spend the night in conditions lacking adequate facilities. Others were closer to the bush. Either way, visitors would have a wonderful opportunity to experience the dramatic African nature.

The former US ambassador to the United Nations, Andrew Young, has recently produced a film focusing on the positive sides of Africa, choosing Tanzania as the scene for the movie. In my view, Young places far too much trust on tourism and associated services and industries as the saviour of Tanzania. However, commenting on how the wildlife in the park has become accustomed to the four-wheel drives hauling tourists as being just other peaceful animals, the good ambassador makes a sweet point saying that that’s how we all should be approaching Africa, like “just another peace loving animal.”

Unfortunately, environmental challenges are mounting. There has been a prolonged drought that threatens the farming communities. Agricultural production is naturally dependent on the erratic rains and food shortages are looming. It is predicted that there will be famine, at least in some parts of the country, in the coming season. I asked Damian Gabagambi, a senior researcher at a non-governmental centre for research and training on poverty reduction in Dar es Salaam, REPOA, what his thoughts were about the situation. He explained at length the challenges that the agricultural systems have feeding the rapidly growing population. The expansion of agriculture is leading to deforestation and farmers are invading protected areas, like the Kilombero Valley floodplain in the south that has been designated as a protected wetland under the Ramsar Convention. In an attempt to intensify production, the government is promoting the indiscriminate use of inorganic fertilizer, which will have serious environmental consequences.

According to Dr. Gabagambi, the free range of livestock is catastrophic. Especially with progressive land degradation in their traditional homelands, the pastoralists are roaming everywhere, their goats and sheep clearing the land of all vegetation.

One of Tanzania’s greatest challenges when it comes to both economic development and the environment pertains to population. The country today has more than 41 million people and still growing at an estimated rate of just over 2 percent every year. The population is young: the median age is just 18 years and 43 percent of the population is in the 0-14 age bracket. This puts an enormous strain on agricultural land. The limited availability of farm land and decreasing size of holdings forces people to move after better livelihood opportunities.

As people are pushed out of agriculture, small-scale mining has become one of the biggest environmental problems in this country of ample mineral resources. There is a veritable gold rush as people scramble to open up open pits for mining. In several parts of the country these mines have created a landscape pockmarked with unattractive scars. Habitats for plants and animals are destroyed as farmers cut the trees to gain access to the land perceived to contain their future fortunes and to provide fuel for its exploitation. At the same time, the mines are a major health hazard to the miners themselves. Many use mercury and other dangerous chemicals to extract the minerals. Many do not know about the huge risks they are taking for their lives, as the chemicals destroy their health and the heavy metals affect their central nervous system, like in the famous historical mercury pollution case of Minamata in Japan. Others know, but do not care. Like a assistant director in the Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs, Servus Amo Sagday remarked when we were discussing the issue: “People don’t worry about the longer-term consequences as they want to make money now.”

Said another official: “Tanzania is committed to environmental conservation, but if a foreign firm now discovered uranium in one of the national parks, many members of parliament would be tempted to grant a concession for a mine.”

Many rural people move to the cities. The population of Dar es Salaam, the largest city in the country, has burgeoned from a medium-sized town of less than half a million inhabitants 30 years ago to the current 3 million. For how long can the city remain as liveable as it still is today? Many of the migrants have a hard time finding jobs. And as Tanzania’s education system has been able to train an increasing number of school leavers unemployment becomes a ticking time bomb.

Since the first democratic elections in 1995, there have been certain tensions. Some of the elections have been contentious and there have been squabbles between the mainland and Zanzibar. One day when we were driving through the city, Jed asked Blandina Chege, our counterpart in the Vice President’s Office, a question about Zanzibar. Her response was revealing: ”They are so much trouble,” she sighed. ”They don’t want independence but they want to be different. All the small islands are troublesome. You go to international meetings and they are always talking as if they were afraid someone annexing them. All the small nations are like that. Not Swaziland, but when you go to African meetings, the Lesotho representatives are always talking endlessly. Same with Uganda and Rwanda and Burundi; they want to have their way.”

Mwalimu, with all his mistakes, demonstrated that he actually was a descent chap by officially retiring from politics in 1990 and keeping to his word that Tanzania would be a democratic country. With this gracious exit from the national politics, he truly achieved the status of an elderly statesman. He continued to be active on the world scene and was the chief mediator in the conflict in Burundi towards the end of his life in the late-1990s.

In 2009, the Ibrahim Prize was not delivered. The news hit the stands while I was in Tanzania. In 2007 Mo Ibrahim, the Sudanese-born business mogul and founder of Celtel, established the Ibrahim Prize for Achievement in African Leadership. The prize is awarded to a “democratically elected former African Executive Head of State or Government who has served their term in office within the limits set by the country's constitution and has left office in the last three years.” The selection committee is chaired by Kofi Annan, the past UN Secretary-General, and consists of such luminaries as the former president of Finland Martti Ahtisaari (who was awared the 2008 Nobel Peace Prize), Mary Robinson (the former president of Ireland and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights), Mohamed El Baradei (the high profile head of the International Atomic Energy Agency) and others. This year the committee refused to nominate anyone for the prize. This is sad testimony to the fact that in recent times no African leader can claim to have the qualities required to actually deserve such a prize. What is it with these people that makes them—allows them!—go against people’s will year after year, often decade after decade?

On my last day in town when there was a drizzling rain, Blandina, Jed and I searched for a place to have lunch. We entered a simple establishment with a few tables and coal grill visible from the dining area. Its name, Al Basha, and the menu suggested Middle Eastern specialties. We sat at a wooden table and after a while were approached by a large Tanzanian waiter with a friendly smile on his face. We said that we were a bit in a hurry and wanted to know what items could be served rather fast. The bearlike waiter slowly explained that, because the food was prepared on the premises, it would all take some time and it would be difficult to rush. There were no other customers in the restaurant. Three cooks were visible loitering around the grill. Deciding to try some other place—there were several in the vicinity—we got up to go, when a young Lebanese woman rushed from behind a counter and asked us to please sit down again. She was apparently the proprietor of the venue and had witnessed our interaction with the kind but inefficient employee. She immediately told us what would be fast and what to combine for a fulfilling lunch. In 30 seconds or so she virtually told us what to order and we were soon sitting contented with glasses of fresh mango juice in front of us. I couldn’t but help to wonder whether the lack of urgency displayed by the Tanzanian staff was not another legacy of Nyerere’s socialist experiment.

Still today Dar es Salaam remains a pleasant place, but one must be concerned about its future, as well as the future of the entire country. Coping with the challenges of a youthful and rapidly growing population, environmental degradation and climatic variability will require that the economy will be able to expand to absorb all the new entrants into the modern sector. Otherwise, the enviably harmonious lifestyle in the House of Peace will be threatened. It is up to the Tanzanians to create the conditions for such economic development that will provide opportunities and incentives for