The Problem Of Desertification

Environmental ethics has widely circled around human interactions with biotic ecosystems. Little voice has been given to city residents who are overexposed to environmental hazards. It is a subject rarely touched upon by mainstream environmentalist. Though conservation efforts receive much media attention and advocacy, environmental pollution in urban areas inhabited by minorities and the impoverished receive less attention despite it clearly being a grave injustice. It fact, it can be argued that minority and impoverished neighborhoods are deliberately targeted by corporations and governmental agencies because of the inherit vulnerability of the inhabitants. It is no secret that the impoverished in this country frequently live in areas characterized

Deserts make up 20% of the Earths surface. Desert biomes come in four major forms. The hot & dry, semi arid, coastal and cold deserts. Deserts are hot and dry because of little vegetation cover, little cloud cover and low atmospheric pressure. The humidity level is very low and there is very little rain each year (about 500mm per year). The soil is shallow and rocky, as a result of very little weathering and supports only a few plant types. The soil has very low organic matter and has a very low salt content. Plants that grow here include the cactus and short shrubs, which have the ability to conserve water. Plants have less leaves, so they use their stems for photosynthesis. The animals tend to burrow during the day to avoid the scorching

Have you ever wonder why they built borders? Or who built them? Or who prevents and controls illegals from crossing, and what they do to accomplish them from crossing? In the book, The Devils Highway, by Luis Alberto Urrea defines the effects the desert has to offer for the immigrant’s entrance. The Devils High Way is a measureless desert past Mexico and Sonora, which is one of the most isolated and driest deserts in the U.S. This is a desert which few

The concept of social justice, and the environment have always been under great threat. However is it possible to mend the two, combine them together, in order to create an equal atmosphere and a sustainable society? The majority of the population have always wanted to prevent the minority in gaining their rights in fear of losing their power, and the nature conquerors have disregarded the wilderness’ needs in fear of losing their profit. Environmental activists and advocates have sought to bridge the gap between the complicated and divisive relationship between the natural world and the advancing technological world. Rebecca Solnit, Wendell Berry, and John Muir all recognize the explicit relationship between social justice and the respect for the natural world.

Now, humans have a steady food supply so they do not have to move about. Therefore, people use fences to keep their animals in one place, which causes overgrazing. Today we see many subjects being affected by desertification. Ute Schaeffer reports the affects of desertification in, Down to Earth: News & Views on Desertification,“(doc.3) It has presented a challenge for governments and aid agencies in over 110 countries for some time, and is a contributing factor in poverty and regional conflicts, for example in Sudan. It has also been a major issue in Egypt, where 90% of the country’s land mass is desert. Faced with a rising population, the government has had to undertake a number of settlement and irrigation projects to create additional living and working space.” Necessary changes were made in order to adapt to the conditions of the desert and the obstacles that have to be faced. It is always presumed that there are only negative aspects to deserts but this isn’t always the case. There is a side to the Sahara desert that acts as a home to several living organisms. The Sahara has vegetation and access to water, which allows life to exist in this region. The Nile Valley, for example, is an area that is still quite full of foliage, trees and other growing things. This area is an exception, because of the way it is fed by the Nile River. Another area of the Sahara that has some vegetation to it is in the North, along the Mediterranean where olive trees grow

The Dust Bowl, it was the largest man-made ecological disaster in the 1930s. Although some people might argue that human have very little to do with it, or the whole event was nothing but the result of climate change, there are many factors to prove that human activities such as, overgrazing, heavy agricultural machinery, overly expended the grass land for farming, and habitat destruction were the key factors that led to the Dust Bowl. When watching the documentary about the Dust Bowl, one can see that before the Europeans and the farmers took over the land, it was naturally covered with beautiful native plants, such as tall grass and flowers. In the meantime, there were also native species like coyotes, buffalos, and rabbets which were totally controlled in term of numbers. But also, they were there as a

Between the 1930s and 1940s, the southwestern Great Plains region of America suffered a severe environmental disaster known as the Dust Bowl, that resulted from the combination of a huge water shortage and harsh farming techniques. The drought-stricken plains experienced relentless dust storms that swept through Texas to Nebraska, killing crops, livestock and people. The Dust Bowl further intensified the devastating economical impacts of the Great Depression and drove hundreds of families to migrate in search of work and better living conditions all the while capturing the nation’s artists, musicians, and writers.

The usage of land in the Mojave Desert is negatively affecting the desert as a whole. “Some key species are indicators of the overall ecological health of the region … most of these species continue to decline.” was stated by the mojave defenders. Certain animals such as the Mojave ground squirrel represent the health of our environment, and certain groups are inefficiently using the land of the Mojave Desert. Ultimately, this is leading to a decline in these populations.

In this paper I will defend John Arthur’s argument of entitlement and desert against Peter Singer’s theory of our duty to the global poor. We as privileged citizens, living in a prosperous country, do have some responsibility to help the tens of thousands of children under the age of 5 who die everyday from starvation and treatable disease. It seems natural that we as citizens of a first world country have a duty to help the global poor through charity. However that “duty” is vague and is under heavy moral debate. We as privileged citizens, living in a prosperous country, do have some responsibility to help the global poor. However, this rightful duty should not necessarily live up to the extreme and overwhelming expectations of Peter Singer. John Arthur’s argument of entitlement and desert is more realistic, logical, and more applicable to the world we live in today.

As lack of water and a particularly dry climate out competes shrubs, trees, and grasslands across Colorado, erosion rates increase reducing the infiltration of moisture into the soil. Causation is believed to have come from heavy livestock grazing, fire suppression, and the introduction of exotic annual plants. Habitat problems for animals and communities that rely on ranching and hunting have been directly affected by these desertification effects. Desertification has had large ecological impacts on the state of Colorado. Vegetation and ecosystems are among the most crucially impacted by the effects of desertification. While Colorado continues its dry drought like climate, restoration of soil becomes one of the major solutions to fight off desertification. Because of the overuse of our land in past generations, we are continuing to see the harmful effects due to desertification. The overall impact on humans produced by desertification is best noticed by a diminishing food production as well as a wealth of water sources becoming dry. People in affected areas are likely to experience poor water quality, dust storms, and pollution. More importantly, as soil loses its nutrients, it no longer becomes farmable; thus, impacting local businesses, livestock, and the many people in that community. If desertification continues in Colorado, an increase of lost farmlands and livestock will pose an economic decease within agriculture markets, farmers will be forced to move to find better

Great Basin is a landform that has no water and has arid, rocky mountains. Great Basin is part of Idaho, Oregon and California, the entire Nevada state and much of Utah is part of the Great Basin region. Any water that goes into the region will either evaporate, seep into the ground, or become a short lakes called playas that will also evaporate or dry up soon. There is no water that will lead you to the sea so you would have to travel by land. Great Basin is considered as the largest of the four main deserts.

In the remote southern seas, there is a cluster of islands. The weather is fair, the land is fertile and the ocean is rich with fish. Each island is inhabited by a different race of people. Although physically they look alike, you can tell them apart by their styles of dress, their distinctive dialects and even their most casual gestures. A tour of the archipelago reveals that each island has its own unique form of architecture. If there is any similarity between them, it is that each race builds in a manner that is stubbornly at odds with the immediate environment. On rocky hillsides, there are wooden huts and in wooded valleys, towns of brick. Arid uplands are irrigated and planted with leafy gardens, where as, on fertile plains, the

Presently droughts occurring every two years and when it does rain only fractions of what the region is used to comes down because a rise in of this food prices, homelessness, diseases, social chaos is in full heat. One in every 3 people you see is dying from malnutrition.Feeding centers and medical supply demands are so high and the respond to get food and water there is not happening fast enough.If poor hygiene continues death will be the result.

Natural causes leading to dissertation have been ongoing for the last few thousand years. That is to say, since the start of the world. As Brady, Nyle C., and Ray R. Weil. state in their book Elements of the Nature and Properties of Soils “Water deficiency is a major characteristic of these (arid) soils.” Soils without consistent water and the ability to store water require excessive care. Other natural causes are wild animal overpopulation or underpopulation, bare land, forest fires and natural disasters. While these many causes may seem overwhelming to correct there is much hope for arid lands.

Estimates of the percentage of illegal households in Egypt have been surprisingly large. Perhaps the highest estimate was by Hernando De Soto, where 92% of the urban sector and 87% of the rural sector were classified by him as ‘informal’ – 70% of which were classified as belonging to the ‘poor’ (De Soto, 1998). A more recent study estimated the number of “unplanned” informal households (households built on privately owned land but in violation of land use or building regulations) to be 70% of all Egyptian households (10Tooba, 2017). The aggregated data by governorate in this study allows for drawing interesting conclusions. For example, the study shows that “land-locked” cities of the Delta that do not have access to vacant desert land have the highest percentage of informal households (up to 93% in ?????). On the contrary, desert cities had much lower percentages of informal tenure, ranging from 8% to 28%. Additionally, those cities with access to both agricultural and desert land still had very high percentage of informal housing, ranging from 51% to 79% (Shawkat 2016;10 Tooba, 2017). Hence, it seems that informal urbanization is strongly tied to agricultural land; second, whenever privately owned agricultural land was available, it was prioritized for urbanization. Even when access to desert land was an option, the growth on agricultural land has superseded the urbanization in the desert.