The Earth has a total landmass of 57.5 million square miles (36.8 billion acres). Of this, 50% is considered uninhabitable. Antarctica alone makes up 9.4% of this area; deserts, glaciers, and mountains make up the rest. Of this 50%, an estimated one half of this is unusable for farmland. The Tundra and Taiga make up 15.8% of this land alone with the majority located in Canada, Alaska, and Russia. This leaves us with an estimated 9.2 billion acres of potential land for farmland and today it is estimated that there are 5.1 billion acres available to be at 100%. Without expanding into Northern Canada or Siberia, today we can conclude that we are at a 45% usage rate for the world’s population for farmland alone. Take into account all the homes, roads, malls, buildings, parking lots, and everything from treatment plants to sewage, we can consider the amount of arable land altered today is at 70%. In America, using calculations from the Department of Transportation, roads in America alone would pave the state of Kentucky.
Our early ancestors instituted the Homestead Act that allowed the government to control, monitor, and record the land for farm use. By World War I, 44% of the lower 48 states had been converted to farmland in order to support the war effort. This peaked at 59% in the 1950s and has since declined to make room for city and urban expansion. This does not include cities or urban development. When land capacity reaches maximum potential, farmland must decline as population grows. Since the 1950s, this has been occurring in the lower 48 states.
By the 1960s, the lower 48 states, along with Europe, Argentina, and Australia had no more land available to feed the ever growing world population. In response to this increasing need, land around the world was and continues to be aggressively converted in order to prevent food shortages, including jungles throughout the world. We began to see growth hormones and genetic engineering to increase yields and avoid jeopardizing our food resources. With 4.1 billion acres of farmland, we can assess that 0.58 acres per person is necessary today to sustain all of our food. Now we also need to include housing, roads, sanitation, work environments, oil, coal, electricity, etc. Today it is estimated that it requires 1.04 acres of cleared land to support the needs of every person in the world today. Looking at it from this perspective, we are highly efficient as a species.
At our current rate of use, we can conclude that when the population reaches 8.85 billion people, we will have exhausted all of our resources and completely decimated all the forests, prairies, and jungles by this time. After this point, all arable land will be exhausted, and we will need to move and learn to live and adapt to environments in areas such as Siberia, Yukon, and the Northwest Territories in order to feed the population. We will be at this point by 2027.
With 5.1 billion acres available, and 0.58 acres per person needed, the maximum potential population of the planet will reach its limits before it reaches 16 billion people based upon our current usage. This includes no new housing, stores, roads, etc., only farmland. At this point, all forests, prairies, and jungles will be gone and every tree and blade of grass wiped out in order to feed and maintain this population. This is an unrealistic number to attain, and an environmental collapse will occur well before this time, but gives us a total maximum. Science indicates that a 50% alteration will begin this collapse, and we are near this today.
Our early ancestors instituted the Homestead Act that allowed the government to control, monitor, and record the land for farm use. By World War I, 44% of the lower 48 states had been converted to farmland in order to support the war effort. This peaked at 59% in the 1950s and has since declined to make room for city and urban expansion. This does not include cities or urban development. When land capacity reaches maximum potential, farmland must decline as population grows. Since the 1950s, this has been occurring in the lower 48 states.
By the 1960s, the lower 48 states, along with Europe, Argentina, and Australia had no more land available to feed the ever growing world population. In response to this increasing need, land around the world was and continues to be aggressively converted in order to prevent food shortages, including jungles throughout the world. We began to see growth hormones and genetic engineering to increase yields and avoid jeopardizing our food resources. With 4.1 billion acres of farmland, we can assess that 0.58 acres per person is necessary today to sustain all of our food. Now we also need to include housing, roads, sanitation, work environments, oil, coal, electricity, etc. Today it is estimated that it requires 1.04 acres of cleared land to support the needs of every person in the world today. Looking at it from this perspective, we are highly efficient as a species.
At our current rate of use, we can conclude that when the population reaches 8.85 billion people, we will have exhausted all of our resources and completely decimated all the forests, prairies, and jungles by this time. After this point, all arable land will be exhausted, and we will need to move and learn to live and adapt to environments in areas such as Siberia, Yukon, and the Northwest Territories in order to feed the population. We will be at this point by 2027.
With 5.1 billion acres available, and 0.58 acres per person needed, the maximum potential population of the planet will reach its limits before it reaches 16 billion people based upon our current usage. This includes no new housing, stores, roads, etc., only farmland. At this point, all forests, prairies, and jungles will be gone and every tree and blade of grass wiped out in order to feed and maintain this population. This is an unrealistic number to attain, and an environmental collapse will occur well before this time, but gives us a total maximum. Science indicates that a 50% alteration will begin this collapse, and we are near this today.