Problem 1
What is sustainability? Is it possible to have sustainable population growth? Sustainable use of fossil fuels? Sustainable use of forest trees? Justify your answers.
Problem 2
Describe what is meant by 'the demographic transition' in a human population. Explain why it might be important, for future management of human population growth, to discover whether the demographic transition is an academic ideal or a process through which all human populations necessarily pass.
Problem 3
The number of people that the Earth can support depends on their standard of living. Argue the case either for or against developing nations having the right to expect standards of living those in the developed world take for granted.
Problem 5
Discuss the pros and cons of agricultural monocultures.
Problem 6
One of the main bodies regulating the production of organic food (food produced without synthetic fertilizers or pesticides) in the United Kingdom is the Soil Association. Explain why you think it has adopted this name.
Problem 7
Explain the meaning and importance of the terms economic injury level and economic threshold.
Problem 8
Weigh up the advantages and disadvantages of the chemical and biological control of pests.
Problem 9
Explain why methods of pest control and methods of soil fertility maintenance need to be considered together in integrated farminq systems.
Problem 10
Hilborn and Walters (1992) have suggested that there are three attitudes that ecologists can take when they enter the public arena. The first is to claim that ecological interactions are too complex, and our understanding and our data too poor, for definite pronouncements to be made (for fear of being wrong). The second possibility is for ecologists to concentrate exclusively on ecology and arrive at a recommendation designed to satisfy purely ecological criteria. The third is for ecologists to make ecological recommendations that are as accurate and realistic as possible, but to accept that these will be incorporated with a broader range of factors when management decisions are made - and may be rejected. Which of these do you favor, and why?
