Swarna Kamal Chowdhury’s Academic Discourse

Essay
Environmental Improvement cannot coexist with Urban Development

As population grows, a need for more houses for people to live in develops. This is what causes urban
development. As the demand of housing increases, cities begin to expand into new areas. Urbanisation is a global
problem with various impacts in different fields. It is the transformation of society from rural life to life in towns and
cities. Urbanisation affects the environment and results in the loss of green space. This also leads to the destruction
of animal habitats and ultimately results in the loss or extinction of certain species.
The prevalent view is that city growth magnifies the dangers from natural hazards. However, until very
recently, too little attention has been paid to the ways in which the defining attributes of cities can lead to greater
safety and not greater danger for city residents. For instance, urban residents are frequently less vulnerable to natural
hazards as compared to rural populations. In addition, it is important to understand that it is unhelpful to suppose
that urbanization intensifies the net impact of natural hazards by putting large numbers of people in harm’s way.
What is more likely is that urbanization diminishes the impact of natural hazards by putting people – much more
effectively than a dispersed settlement pattern would – in help’s way.
Urbanization is rapidly advancing in India especially in the metropolitan cities more than the small and
medium town and rural settlements. The problems arising due to unprecedented growth of metropolitan area is not
only a consequence of poverty and demographic concentration but mere a result of complex socio-economic,
political and market forces. The effects of such concentrated pattern of urbanization have far reaching implications.
It articulates in not only the settlement and population distribution pattern, but also concerns national issues such
as economic development, resource conservation and social progress. Therefore, decentralization of population and
economic activities is a pre-requisite for an appropriate process of a settlement system. Suffice to say that the
National Urbanization Policy is an imperative need to ensure the rural-urban integrated development in terms of
spatial and economic activities within a regional perspective. Probably most of the major environmental problems of
the next century will result from the continuation and sharpening of existing problems that currently do not receive
enough political attention. The problems are not necessarily noticed in many countries or nothing is done even if the
situation has been detected. The most emerging issues are climate changes, freshwater scarcity, deforestation, fresh
water pollution and population growth. These problems are very complex and their interactions are hard to define.
It is very important to examine problems through the social-economic-cultural system. Even the interconnections
between environmental problems are now better known, we still lack exact information on how the issues are linked,
on what degree they interact and what are the most effective measures. One problem is to integrate land and water
use planning to provide food and water security.
Due to the growing population, demands for water, food, housing, heat, energy, clothing and consumer
goods are increasing alarmingly. Increasing demand forces farmers to exhaust the soil or to use marginal land. The
only way to produce food to all this population is to create more effective agricultural production. Irrigation is the
most important way, because in the future the arable land is not increasing, probably decreasing, due to erosion and
land deterioration. Until now, the increasing of the fertilizers has helped to produce bigger yields. The population
growth is nowadays so fast that increasing use of fertilizers is not enough. The next step in producing more food will
be different crops and irrigation methods, like drip irrigation and water saver plants. At present half of the world’s
population is living in the urban areas and the other half in the rural areas. This means that the other of the
population, in rural areas, has to produce the food to the population in urban areas. Most of the population growth
takes place in urban areas, which means more pressure to the rural people to produce food for the growing amount
of urban people.
Growing urbanization means more consumption and need of different products. The production of these
needs water and creates more pollutants. In developing countries where the urbanization is occurring most rapidly,
the technology is not high enough to take responsibility of water treatment and clean production. Many Western
companies produce their products in developing countries because of more flexible environmental law and cheaper
production costs. This puts extra pressure on the environment of the developing countries. Even the industrialized
countries, with higher standards of living and greater numbers of cars, produce far more air pollution and greenhouse
gases than developing countries, they can reduce environmental hazards by using technology such as smokestack
scrubbers, emission systems, and wastewater treatment plants. Developing countries do not have this new
technology or capacity to do so. The consumption is far lower but the expensive energy-efficient or clean-up
technologies are economically impractical for these countries. For these reasons environmental problems occur more
often in developed countries.
In many cities the air is already so polluted that it has been causing illness and premature deaths among
elderly people and children. Almost all cities have changed to motorized road vehicles, which has increased the use
of fossil fuels and increased greenhouse-gas emissions. This explosive growth in the number of road vehicles is a big
problem in many cities. The pollution is high due to constant traffic and causes respiratory diseases to city habitants.
The lack of sanitation and sewage treatment is the biggest factor regarding water pollution. Local water bodies are
used as a dumping ground for untreated water from urban areas or industries. Chemical discharge is also a
widespread problem. Most of the coastal cities have serious problems with dirty, contaminated beaches and water
which is a serious health risk to the bathers and for the whole city. If solid wastes are left in the open spaces,
wasteland and streets, serious environmental problems will follow.
Looking at the current scenario, we can say that half the world population will live in urban environments.
Unfortunately in order to create an urbanized area, a natural environment must be destroyed. Urbanization and
human activity within an urban system produces many destructive and irreversible effects on natural environments
such as climate change, air pollution, sediment and soil erosion, increased flooding magnitude and loss of habitat.
The burning of fossil fuels also emit greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide that heat up the atmosphere around the
source and usually the source is within urban environments. Urbanization and human activity creates a microclimate
that is not environmentally healthful. Human land use, affects soil in the environment and increases the potential for
erosion. Moreover, human use of land in the urban environment has increased both the magnitude and frequency
of floods.
In order to urbanize, natural land must be paved and turned into cities. This requires that flora and fauna
either lose their homes or are relocated. Urbanization is virtually irreversible. Whole habitats are eliminated and
permanent resources are depleted. Even though the consequences of human activity are unintended, the effects can
be far reaching and potentially damaging. Urbanization is a permanent land use application. Urban ecological policies
should clean up and rebuild cities in balance with nature rather than destroy natural environments. With more and
more people living and moving to cities, the problem will extend beyond existing boundaries and result in more
damage to the natural environment. The effects of urbanisation on the environment are permanent and extensive
and urban policy must change in order to save what is left in the natural world.

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