One child per family: a green innovation?

It's not easy to defend a social program as broad and controlling as China's one-child policy, but from a purely EcoGeek perspective, it needs attention. Don't accuse us of promoting the idea, though. It's weird, it's broken, it's dangerous, but if it could only be voluntary, it would be the finest environmental innovation our world has ever seen. Aside from, possibly, the innovations of birth control, without which any kind of family planning is impossible.

China recently released some statistics defending its one-child per family policy, and you can't argue with the significance. So far, they say, the policy has 'prevented the births' of over 300 million children...roughly the population of the United States. And they estimate that the policy has prevented the release of 1.3 billion tons of CO2, roughly equivalent to the output of Germany.

Population is the single most important factor in climate change, urban pollution, the water crisis, agricultural collapse and ecological destruction. Yes, our ultra-fabulous way of life in America doesn't help, but the strain of an estimated 9 billion people by 2050 is going to push the earth close to its breaking point no matter how simple a life those 9 billion people lead.

China is careful to point out that it doesn't believe the one-child policy is right for every nation. But they stand strong behind their assertion that population control is entirely vital to the fight against climate change. It's not a popular assertion, but is, without doubt, entirely correct.

Via Reuters