Prompt:
“What man calls civilization always results in deserts. Man is never on the square – he uses up the fat and greenery of the earth. Each generation wastes a little more of the future with greed and lust for riches.”
Don Marquis
Assignment:
With our modern awareness of ecology are we likely to make sufficient progress in conservation, or are we still in danger of damaging the earth beyond repair? Plan your response, and then write an essay…
Most people are not greedy by nature. When they use resources, they will use it to the extent that is sufficient for their use. However, there is a group of people who use the resource beyond what they are expected to use, hence, resulting in depletion of resources. This is shown by several examples from history and past events.
The first case happens to the Singapore government. Singapore is a country without natural resources. It needs to import resources such as coal and brings it to a power station to convert it to energy. Also, because of the limited land, forested areas have to be cleared to make way for public housing. In recent years, this has been increasing. In August 2012, the Singapore government ordered that the forested areas in Pasir Ris to be cleared to make space for some 50 blocks of public housing. According to a statistics from the National Environment Agency, at least 20 species of different animals were affected by it. This example serves to show that despite the awareness of conservation, when the needs arise, human will still use the necessary resources to achieve their goals.
The next case can be seen in The Big Tree, a fictional elementary school story by a Malaysian author, Gregory Koh. In this story, a child named Darwin lived near a tree of 50 years old named Joe. One day, Darwin was sitting under the Joe and was bored. He spoke to Joe about being bored and Joe replied that he could cut down some of its branches and together with a rope to use it to make a swing. Some years later, Darwin was invited by some of his classmates to play in a tree house. This made Darwin envy. Darwin went back to Joe and asked he could make him a tree house. Joe gave a positive reply and instructed Darwin to cut more of his thick branches, and make a tree house on top of him. When Darwin was 30 and got married, he came to Joe and asked him if he could build him a house for his family. Joe hesitated but gave Darwin a positive answer. This time, Joe asked Darwin to cut off his trunk, as it is big enough to provide him ample resources. Joe was gone. This example shows that the needs of human will always surpass the awareness of conservation even at the expense of damaging the earth.
Finally, in the case of Palm Corporation, a company specializing in manufacturing furniture, they manufacture thousands of furniture a year, and in the process, cut down many trees. In recent years, Palm Corporation saw the negative impact that it had made over the years and decided to make some effort in conserving the ecology. For every tree they cut, they would plant a replacement in its place. Initially, this was a good effort. However, the replacement trees take time to grow, and while they are growing, Palm Corporation continues cutting the mature trees. In economics terms, the demand for mature trees exceeds the supply of it. This example shows that even with awareness and initiatives in place, the depletion of resources can still be inevitable.
All in all, from the three examples cited above, unless alternatives are developed to replace the resources needed from mother earth, the danger of damaging the earth beyond repair is real and inevitable. Awareness of conservation is not adequate and alternatives are the way to preserve the ecology.