Resource: Population Growth and Outdoor America Outdoor Writers' Perspectives

Title:	Population Growth and Outdoor America Outdoor Writers' Perspectives
Resource type:	Booklet
Topics:	Ecosystems, Individual Choices, Statewide/Global
Keywords:	population, population growth, outdoor recreation
Audience:	All
Region:	Minnesota Statewide, Outside Minnesota
Summary:	This 2005 booklet is a collection of essays by five journalists about the impact of population on aspects of the natural world.
Content:	Every major threat to outdoor recreation -- climate change, mercury pollution in lakes, hunting access, habitat loss, less productive fisheries -- is, at its base, an issue about the human impact on the natural world. This human footprint can be broken into two main components: number of people (population) and the consumption/affluence level of people (higher levels currently increase the footprint). While some outdoor writers have addressed this issue of how human needs and numbers affect wildlife and habitats, much more can be done to help hunters, anglers and all outdoor recreation enthusiasts understand more fully the consequences of human population growth on their pursuits. The Izaak Walton League prepared a 22-page booklet in 2005 to encourage, engage, and assist the outdoor journalism community to consider ways to report and write about the conservation consequences, and a whole series of adverse impacts to our world, of human population growth. This publication is a collection of essays by five prominent journalists. Minnesotan Shawn Perich writes how Minnesotans are loving the North Shore to death. Joel Vance from Missouri writes about a Minnesota dairy farmer and how a way of life is dying as rural communities are consumed by sprawl. Holly Endersby of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers summarizes the 1972 Rockefeller Commission Report on Population Growth and the American Future, commissioned by President Nixon: "After two years of concentrated effort, we have concluded that, in the long run, no substantial benefits will result from further growth of the Nation's population, rather that the gradual stabilization of our population through voluntary means would contribute significantly to the Nation's ability to solve its problems. We have looked for, and have not found, any convincing economic argument for continued population growth. The health of our country does not depend on it, nor does the vitality of business nor the welfare of the average person." Copies of "Population Growth and Outdoor America" are available for viewing and free downloading from http://www.iwla.org/index.php?ht=action/GetDocumentAction/i/989 A companion piece, "An Outdoor Journalist's Guide to Population Issues," which provides background information, reference sources, and tips on writing stories about population growth and getting them published, can be downloaded from http://www.iwla.org/index.php?ht=action/GetDocumentAction/i/987
Suggested by:	Philipp Muessig
Added:	08/16/05
Updated:	07/27/11