A newly released policy brief from Progressives for Immigration Reform (PFIR) contains a warning about the ecological impact of United States population growth.
The report, entitled From Big to Bigger, How Mass Immigration and Population Growth Have Exacerbated America’s Ecological Footprint, examines the impact that uncontrolled growth and high immigration levels are having on the country’s natural environment, and provides scientific evidence for why America is exhausting its natural resources.
Among its major findings, the article reveals that even as the U.S. ecological footprint continues to increase, the Earth’s biocapacity is decreasing. Moreover, if current growth trends continue, the American population will increase 43 percent by 2050, and 82 percent of that growth will result from immigration.
“[We are] living well beyond [our] ecological means and rapid population growth driven primarily by high immigration levels is aggravating the country’s ecological deficit,” says Leon Kolankiewicz, the publication’s author who is a wildlife biologist and consulting environmental planner.
“If environmentalists are serious about facing the challenge of sustainability, they must begin to address the threat of unsustainable U.S. population growth,” he adds.
The report also found that the U.S. has the third-highest ecological footprint in the world, exceeded only by two small Middle Eastern oil-producing countries.
PFIR is a nonprofit organization that seeks to educate the public about the unintended consequences of mass migration and promotes the principles of protecting workers’ rights and ensuring fair wages for America’s workforce.
