Natural resource depletion is the sum of net forest depletion, energy depletion, and mineral depletion.

It's main reason is rising population on Earth. In the last 45 years, the demand for earth's natural resources has doubled, due to rising living standards in rich and emerging countries and increasing world population. Today humanity uses 50% of the planet's fresh water. In 40 years, we will use 80%. 

Causes of Concern:

Energy deficiency

Water shortages: Demand for water over the next 30 years is projected to rise by almost a half at a time when the groundwater table in many regions of the world is falling and large areas are suffering from shortages due to drought, large-scale irrigation, pollution, dams and even war.

Finite land resources are also coming under enormous pressure.

Urbanisation displaces millions of hectares of high-quality agricultural land each year.  

Due to the rise in population, deforestation is introduced for forests to make way for housings and other human uses. As a result of deforestation, presently about one half of the forests that once covered Earth have been destroyed. An estimated 18 million acres of forests are destroyed each year.It occurs for many different reasons, and it has several negative implications on the atmosphere and the quality of the land in and surrounding the forest.

At the same time, tens of thousands of square kilometres of pristine forest are cut down to grow crops needed for food, of which we will need 70% more by 2050 to feed the world's massively expanding population, according to the United Nations.

 

Because deforestation is so extensive, it has made several significant impacts on the environment, including Soil erosion, Global Warming caused by the rise of greenhouse gases, Extinction of species and loss of biodiversity, flooding and drought.
One of the most pressing issues that deforestation creates is soil erosion. The removal of trees causes higher rates of erosion, increasing risks of landslides, which is a direct threat to many people living close to deforested areas. As forests get destroyed, so does the habitat for millions of animals. It is estimated that 80% of the world's known biodiversity lives in the rainforests, and the destruction of these rainforests is accelerating extinction at an alarming rate.

In fact, vast swathes of natural land are being converted for all manner of uses across the world, destroying essential so-called ecosystem services such as flood protection and genetic resources used for live-saving drugs.

 Mineral reserves are also depleting quickly. 

 

What should be done?

Coping most successfully with resource depletion will requires a broad range of strategies. These are likely to include more local living, low energy lifestyles, dematerialization, design for repair and 3Rs as our primary resource allocation mechanism.

Reuse, Reduce & Recycle (3Rs)

1.    Bring reusable bags and containers that could be bought at nearby supermarkets. This reduces the need to use plastic bags.

2.    Choose products that are returnable, reusable, or refillable over single-use items.

3.    Avoid individually wrapped items, snack packs, and single-serve containers. Pack them individually on your own to reduce packaging wastage. Packaging makes up 30% of the weight and 50% of trash by volume.

4.    Be aware of double-packaging - some "bulk packages" are just individually wrapped items packaged yet again and sold as a bulk item.

5.    Purchase items such as dish soap and laundry detergents in concentrate forms.

6.    Compost food scraps and yard waste. Food and yard waste accounts for about 11 percent of the garbage thrown away in the Twin Cities metro area. Many types of food scraps, along with leaves and yard trimmings, can be combined in your backyard compost bin.

7.    Unsubscribe to mails that are unwanted. The average resident in America receives over 30 pounds of junk mail per year.

8.    Buy items made of recycled content, and use and reuse them as much as you can. For instance, use both sides of every page of a notebook before moving on to the next clean notebook.  Use unneeded, printed on printer paper for a scratch pad.

9.    Feel free to reject plastic bags or products with more packaging.

 

Potential solutions

Need to explore more resources: In the longer term, in addition to learning how to consume less, we are also likely to have to deal with resource depletion by venturing beyond our first planet to find more resources.

Productivity improvements, alone, is expected to help meet almost 30% of demand for resources by 2030 and present trillions of dollars of savings to global companies.

New technologies, substitute materials and greater investment in supply will also be needed.

More Radical solutions may be required: Policy intervention is needed to protect resources that are not priced or incorrectly priced. Water is a case in point. Despite being the world's most precious and increasingly scarce resource, it is incredibly cheap, and in many parts of the world, free. Land is another example. Huge chunks of the natural world have no monetary value placed upon them, and yet they provide services worth trillions of dollars to the global economy.

Energy efficiencies, renewable energy and a massive increase in recycling will also be needed.

It's time to think of 'Circular economy', a comprehensive rethink of our current model of production and consumption, where one company's waste is another's raw material, and where an obsession with the ownership of material goods is moderated.

 

Resource depletion in numbers

 

It took 130,000 years for the earth's population to reach 800 million in about 1780. Currently, almost 800 million are added every 10 years

About 200 years ago, each human had the equivalent of 24 football fields of land and freshwater resources. Today, each human has three fields and in 40 years it will be less than two

By 2030, there will be three billion more middle-class consumers in the global economy

Water scarcity affects one in three people on every continent of the globe

On current trends, over the next 20 years humans will use 40% more water than they do now

It takes 2,400 litres of water to produce a hamburger and 11,000 litres to make a pair of jeans

The average cost of drilling for oil has doubled over the past decade

Forty-four million people were driven into poverty by rising food prices in the second half of 2010

Demand for steel is set to rise by 80% between 2010 and 2030.

 

 

Climate Change and Resource depletion are inter-linked challenges

 

Given finite resources, the potentially infinite increase in demand for products is clearly unsustainable.

 

Sustained economic development is impossible within an effectively closed system like Planet Earth. It is therefore more than a little surprising how much attention today is being focused on climate change and yet how little is being directed toward the potentially far more pressing issue of resource depletion. Fortunately, these two challenges are inter-linked to the extent that most measures intended to combat climate change do involve using less resources and/or recycling precious materials. 

It cannot be denied that the Earth's natural resources are currently being consumed at an increasing and totally unsustainable level.

In 2011 the United Nations Environment Programme reported that, if nothing changes, humanity will demand 140 billion tons of minerals, ores, fossil fuels and biomass every year by 2050. This is three times our current rate of resource consumption, and far beyond what the Earth can supply. We therefore need to fairly rapidly learn to decouple natural resource use and environmental impacts from economic growth.

 

 

CALL TO ACTION:

Let's not just end with writing a report on this topic. Let's put our maximum efforts to promote and support resource conservation. In my various activities and campaigns, I advocate this and address this issue to save paper, save energy, save water, save trees and SAVE PLANET.

 

Sources:

http://www.bbc.com/news/business-16391040

McKinsey, Homo Sapiens Foundation,

World Health Organisation,

Protected Water Fund

http://www.explainingthefuture.com/resource_depletion.html

https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-causes-for-a-natural-resource-depletion