Written By Karen I. Shragg and Henry L. Barbaro
There is now a day devoted to endangered species. Predictably this day will be filled with sad stories of the precarious situations in which many iconic animals and many lesser-known ones find themselves. If we follow the typical scenario, the wildlife community will address this crisis with a combination of proposals that include preserving individual tracts of land, restricting pesticides, increasing hunting regulations, and reducing carbon emissions. These efforts are not working and will never work because of human overpopulation, which is the fundamental driver of a growing list of endangered species, locally and globally.
It is ironic that wildlife conservation advocates, supposedly steeped in ecological understanding, have done everything but expose the human enterprise as the real guilty party in the demise of wildlife. Just by being the numbers we are and living the lifestyles we do; people are impacting wildlife in ways we are still discovering.
A recent Forbes article provides a good description of where biodiversity stands worldwide --
...an astounding 27,000 species are at risk of extinction, which is an even more astounding 27% of all species we currently know about. That means more than a quarter of all species are threatened with going the way of the dodo.
Broken down by species, the IUCN details 40% of all amphibians are at risk, followed by 34% of conifers, 33% of reef corals, 31% of sharks and rays, 27% of crustaceans, 25% of mammals and 14% of birds.
It’s tough to argue with the fact that humankind is having a dramatic – and terrible – impact on the animal kingdom. Industry, pollution, agriculture, deforestation, air travel and decreasing habitats are conspiring to make it very hard for thousands of species to survive, let alone flourish. And that truth stretches to every corner of the world, be it forest, mountain, reef, ocean, city or savannah.
Will today’s generations be on the right side of history, or will people 100 years from now look back in disbelief as to how people knowingly squandered our biological riches? All this despite having a day, the third Friday in May, devoted to raising awareness on the assault on species – all who were here long before us.
To change course by addressing overpopulation and its impact on wildlife, we must go back to when we could have nuanced conversations based on critical thinking. We need to create public as well as scientific discourse where undeserved labels of nefarious intentions are no longer shouted out from the soapboxes of social media. We must listen -- deeply listen -- to those offering a new way of looking at our problems. We must report the respective evidence widely, with a kind of journalistic integrity sorely missing in today’s world -- one unafraid to tell the truth.
Although humanity as a whole is in this fight to preserve biodiversity, each country in the world has the ultimate responsibility for developing a reasoned population policy based on their respective limited resources, which includes the needs of wildlife. This concept was reinforced when the omnibus bill (passed in December 2022) included $575 million for family planning in areas where population growth threatens biodiversity. The U.S. Congress clearly acknowledged that the primary cause of species extirpation and extinction is human population growth.
An obvious question is what countries have the most endangered species? Mexico is number one (665 species), so perhaps some of the $575 million should go to them. But in terms of birth rate, Mexico only ranks #99 (at 17 births per 1,000 in 2020). Indonesia is #2 for endangered species (583), but their fertility rate has a world ranking (#94) similar to that of Mexico. In contrast, Madagascar is an island nation that has almost double the fertility rate of Mexico and Indonesia and is #3 in terms of endangered species (553). For the sake of biodiversity and passing on the planet's biological heritage to the future inhabitants of Spaceship Earth, it's compelling for Madagascar to reduce its fertility rate.
This is where America comes in. Our nation is #6 when it comes to the relative number of endangered species (475). (America has more endangered species than Brazil -- #9 at 413 species.) Of course, America's fertility ranking is rather low (#141) with 10.9 births per 1,000, but our immigration rate is extremely high. Of all the nations on Earth, the U.S. has the greatest number of immigrants by far (~50 million), with Germany coming in at a distant second place with "only" 16 million.
With a very clear bridge between human population and wildlife habitat, if America is going to preserve its biodiversity, then we must reduce our historically high rates of immigration. The good news is that we already have the tools in our toolbox for addressing growth by immigration. We have E-verify, which helps employers know who they are hiring since much of immigration growth is driven by the promise of jobs. There are legal tools available to us for enforcing the idea that all jobs must go to those with proper paperwork. The other good news is that most Americans are in favor of restricting immigration, especially those who live in border states and can see how unsustainable our current policies are making their lives. The Center for Immigration Studies polling of voters as far back as 2006 indicate a strong desire to curb immigration. https://cis.org/Report/Publics-View-Immigration .With a focus on tackling population growth, the wildlife we say we care about might just have a chance.
Author’s note. Here is my bio, but below is the bio of my collaborator , Henry Barbaro. Hopefully the fact that we are co-writers on this piece will give it legs!
Shragg is a retired nature center director, with a doctorate in critical pedagogy. In 2015 she authored Move Upstream a Call to Solve Overpopulation. Karen's long time activism on the impacts of overpopulation has taken her around the world as a speaker attending COP 25 in Spain and speaking in both China and England. She now runs an environmental consulting LLC and consults on overpopulation.
Barbaro is a land use regional planner and an environmental scientist working in the transportation field. Henry has over 25 years of experience working as an activist on his passion, reducing American population growth in order to protect biodiversity. As such he has done work for Massachusetts Coalition for Immigration Reform, New England Coalition for Sustainable Population, the Massachusetts Environmental Education Society, and the Massachusetts Sierra Club.