What kind of state is the world really in?Optimists proclaim the end of history withthe best of all possible worlds at hand,whereas pessimists see a world in decline andfind doomsday lurking around the corner.Getting the state of the world right is impor-tant because it defines humanity’s problemsand shows us where our actions are mostneeded. At the same time, it is also a scorecardfor our civilization – have we done well withour abilities, and is this a world we want toleave for our children?This book is the work of a skeptical environ-mentalist. Environmentalist, because I – likemost others – care for our Earth and care forthe future health and wellbeing of its succeed-ing generations. Skeptical, because I careenough to want us not just to act on the mythsof both optimists and pessimists. Instead, weneed to use the best available information tojoin others in the common goal of making abetter tomorrow.Thus, this book attempts to measure thereal state of the world. Of course, it is not pos-sible to write a book (or even lots and lots ofbooks for that matter) which measures theentire state of the world. Nor is this my inten-tion. Instead, I wish to gauge the most impor-tant characteristics of our state of the world –the fundamentals. And these should be assessednot on myths but on the best available facts.Hence, the real state of the world. The LitanyThe subtitle of my book is a play on the world’sbest-known book on the environment, TheState of the World. This has been publishedevery year since 1984 by the WorldwatchInstitute and its leader Lester Brown,4and ithas sold more than a million copies. The seriesattempts to identify the world’s most signifi-cant challenges professionally and vera-ciously. Unfortunately, as we shall see, it is fre-quently unable to live up to its objectives. Inmany ways, though, The State of the World is oneof the best-researched and academically mostambitious environmental policy publications,and therefore it is also an essential participantin the discussion on the State of the World.5On a higher level this book plays to ourgeneral understanding of the environment:the Litany of our ever deteriorating environ-ment. This is the view of the environment thatis shaped by the images and messages thatconfront us each day on television, in thenewspapers, in political statements and inconversations at work and at the kitchentable. This is why Time magazine can start offan article in 2000, stating as entirely obvioushow “everyone knows the planet is in badshape.”6Even children are told the Litany, here fromOxford University Press’ Young Oxford Books:“The balance of nature is delicate but essentialfor life. Humans have upset that balance,stripping the land of its green cover, chokingthe air, and poisoning the seas.”7Equally, another Time article tells us how“for more than 40 years, earth has been send-ing out distress signals” but while “we’vestaged a procession of Earth Days . . . thedecline of Earth’s ecosystems has continuedunabated.8The April 2001 Global EnvironmentSupplement from New Scientist talks about the1 Things are getting betterPART1impending “catastrophe” and how we risk con-signing “humanity to the dustbin of evolution-ary history.” Our impact is summarized withthe headline “Self-destruct”:We humans are about as subtle as the asteroidthat wiped out the dinosaurs . . . The damage wedo is increasing. In the next 20 years, the popula-tion will increase by 1.5 billion. These people willneed food, water and electricity, but already oursoils are vanishing, fisheries are being killed off,wells are drying up, and the burning of fossilfuels is endangering the lives of millions. We areheading for cataclysm.9This understanding of the environment is allpervasive.This understanding of the environment isall pervasive. We are all familiar with theLitany:10the environment is in poor shapehere on Earth.11Our resources are runningout. The population is ever growing, leavingless and less to eat. The air and the water arebecoming ever more polluted. The planet’sspecies are becoming extinct is vast numbers –we kill off more than 40,000 each year. Theforests are disappearing, fish stocks are col-lapsing and the coral reefs are dying.We are defiling our Earth, the fertile topsoilis disappearing, we are paving over nature,destroying the wilderness, decimating the bio-sphere, and will end up killing ourselves inthe process. The world’s ecosystem is breakingdown. We are fast approaching the absolutelimit of viability, and the limits of growth arebecoming apparent.12We know the Litany and have heard it sooften that yet another repetition is, well,almost reassuring. There is just one problem:it does not seem to be backed up by the avail-able evidence.Things are better – but not necessarilygoodI will attempt over the course of this book todescribe the principal areas which stake outhumankind’s potentials, challenges and prob-lems – in the past, the present and the future.These areas are selected either because it isimmediately obvious that they are important(e.g. the number of people on earth), becausemodels show they will have a decisive influ-ence on human development (air pollution,global warming) or because they are fre-quently mentioned in the discussion on thestate of the world (chemical fears, e.g. pesti-cides).13In presenting this description I will need tochallenge our usual conception of the collapseof ecosystems, because this conception issimply not in keeping with reality.We are not running out of energy or naturalresources.14There will be more and more foodper head of the world’s population. Fewer andfewer people are starving. In 1900 we lived foran average of 30 years; today we live for 67.According to the UN we have reduced povertymore in the last 50 years than we did in thepreceding 500, and it has been reduced inpractically every country.Global warming, though its size and futureprojections are rather unrealistically pessimis-tic, is almost certainly taking place, but thetypical cure of early and radical fossil fuel cut-backs is way worse than the original