POPULATION PROBLEM

Evening Star, Issue 20053, 19 December 1928, Page 2

POPULATION PROBLEM

WILL STARVATION COMET Discussing the problem of excess population in the ‘ English Review,’ AR 0. A. Merritt-Hawkes points out that two and a-half acres or land are required to supply the requirements of most European labourers. Few people realise what this means in area to a city such as London, with its 7,600,000 inhabitants, which on this basis would require about 19,000,000 acres, or throe-fifths of England. It would mean that London would take the product of this entire area, and its several millions of inhabitants would have nothing to eat, and must starve or move elsewhere. It would be possible, then, to motor hundreds of miles from London without seeing even a village. This calculation is made on the simplest requirements. Should luxuries, such as pheasants, asparagus, strawberries, .tc., be required, a very much larger area would bo needed. Mr Merritt-Hawkes goes on to say that, while there is undoubtedly plenty of food to-day in the world for the present population and for some increase, there is equally no doubt that unless the rate of increase is materially reduced a time of either starvation or brutal struggle will come.

The small, modern family, in which there is a low death rate, combined with long life, is far more satisfactory than the large family of fifty years ago, with its heavy death rate, because it is happier and less wasteful (says Mr Merritt-Hawkes). A sentimental attachment to mere numbers exists in many quarters. A farmer only keeps such a number of cattle as he can provide with a suitable standard of living, but there is so far no “ superfarmer ” to control the human population in relation to the standard of living. “ One man says ‘ Look at Australia—vast spaces’;_ another says ‘ Look at Central Africa—vast spaces. With our present knowledge there is much of ,tno world which wo cannot use; we have not yet learned how to control the drought in Australia, the heat in Africa, the excessive soil salts in America aud Asia, the floods in China and the Mississippi,” says Mr Merritt-Hawkes. “ No one can foretell what knowledge will arise, but it seems unwise to allow our populations to increase beyond the food supply merely because we hope to turn deserts into gardens.” There are cries of “ Back to the land,” which few heed. Whether the tendency to gather in cities is due to degeneracy or not it exists, and the problem it creates must be solved, for men cannot live on the products of factories. The reason of this tendency to herd in cities is not clear. It may be a question of better wages or more amusements, but possibly the real explanation is that man’s herd instinct has increased, and only in cities does he find satisfaction for a deep-seated biological need. The diflerehfial rate of race reproduction Mr Merritt-Hawkes regards as one difficulty of the population question. The population of France is practically stable, and it is believed that in a few _ years many Western European countries Romany, Holland, Britain, Norway, etc.—will also be stable, but in the meantime many

people fear that the Eastern European and Asiatic peoples will increase to an extent which we are apt to call alarming. Whether such fears are well grounded we have not yet sufficient evidence to prove. This fear of socalled inferior races is probably groundless. It has been found time after time that a few superior mortals, be they Nordies or Manchurians or Egyptians, can control the life afld culture of many thousands of inferiors. Even if we had just the right number of people we should_ not have reached the optimum condition unless the majority were adequate producers, either physically or intellectually, and capable of social, not anti-social, conduct.