The Malthusian Trap

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• Thomas Malthus elaborated on a concept in his book – “An Essay on the Principle of Population”, which quite famously inspired Charles Darwin.

More about the Malthusian trap

• About:
  • The Malthusian trap or Malthusian check refers to the theory that as the human population grows there is increasing pressure on earth’s resources, which in turn acts as a check on the further rise in population. 
    • It is named after English economist Thomas Malthus.
• How?
  • Malthus argued that while a rise in food production in a country can lead to improved living standards for the general population, the benefit is likely to be temporary. 
  • This is because, increase in availability of food would encourage people to have more kids since they could afford to feed them now, thus leading to a rise in the total population and a drop in per capita income levels. 
    • Growth may also be stopped or reversed by disease, famine, war, or calamity.
      • [Increased food production > Improved living standards > Rise in population > drop in per capita income levels]
• Inverse relationship:
  • Malthus, in other words, believed that there was an inverse relationship between human population and living standards with rising population leading to lower living standards.

• Way out of the trap:
  • Malthus also offered a way out of this trap. 
    • Population control:
      • For his own time, he advocated population control through an inculcation of good, virtuous, Christian behavior.
    • Inclusive production:
      • He coupled this by pushing for workhouses to make sure the poor and unemployed could contribute to production while receiving welfare. 
  • In this way, population growth may be slowed even as the means for its subsistence is increased.

• Criticisms:
  • No strict correlation:
    • According to critics, there may be no strict inverse correlation between population growth and the living standards of people. 
    • As long as human beings can find ways to use earth’s resources more efficiently, their population can grow without compromising their living standards even in the long-term. 
  • Innovations: 
    • In fact, some argue that as the human population rises, the chances of breakthrough innovations happening rise manifold as there would be more human minds working on solving humanity’s problems.
  • Examples from around the world:
    • India:
      • In India, which boasts the world’s second-biggest population, the Green Revolution in the state of Punjab helped feed its growing population. 
    • Germany:
      • In western economies like Germany, which was battered during World War II, population increases did not hamper development.

Relevance of the theory:

• According to a theory, By 2045, 
  • There could be 49 million more malnourished people living on this planet, and 
  • 40 percent of the world’s population could be suffering from water shortages. 
  • The vast majority of these people will be, as they are now, in the poorer countries of the world.
• The trends are clear for all to see. 
  • As populations expand and people continue to degrade the environment, agricultural yields will shrink while demand increases. 
  • A lack of access to food, water, or basic services, together with an increasing concentration of population, will create major humanitarian and security concerns as we push to the half-way point of the 21st century. 
• Two very important factors will exacerbate these problems that affect some of the world’s poorest nations. 

• The first is urbanization: 
  • Already, more than half the population of the planet lives in a city, with that proportion expected to increase to 70 percent by 2045. 
    • This influx will intensify existing problems present in these cities.
  • Without substantial and effective investment in infrastructure, these cities can neither employ those who come seeking work, nor adequately house them.
• The second factor is climate change: 
  • Coastal population:
    • Asia-Pacific contains many of the countries, like Bangladesh, that risk being submerged by rising sea levels, the vast majority of its population live in low-lying coastal areas. 
  • Food security:
    • Not only do their homes risk being made uninhabitable, but climate change’s effects on agriculture threaten their food supplies. 
    • Human activity has already degraded 25 percent of available land for farming globally, while pollution and overfishing are severely damaging marine ecosystems.

Way ahead

• Amid the COVID pandemic & Ukraine War, supply chain issues and soaring inflation, global food prices have been on the rise since mid-2020 and are now at an all-time high.
• What is of the utmost importance is this: that governments realize the security challenges these Malthusian concerns do and will continue to pose.

Source: TH