Quotes

"You know, I have often thought that at the end of the day, we would have saved more wildlife if we had spent all WWF's money on buying condoms." Sir Peter Scott, founder of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

"We feel this issue is of crucial concern for successful conservation and sustainable development.  Even while environmental goals can be met, conservation efforts will become secondary if population continues to grow at the present rate.  The sheer number of people, forced to exploit the environment for extraction of finite resources to meet basic needs, impacts the limited amount of progress we have been able to make." Conservation  International, 1999

"There will not be an environment left to worry about unless we get the population crisis under control." John H. Adams,     Natural Resources Defense Council

"Achieving and maintaining a sustainable relationship between human populations and the natural resource base of the earth is the single most critical long-term issue facing the peoples of the world and this issue will increasingly be the focus of international affairs for the foreseeable future." Russell E. Train,      World Wildlife Fund

"If steps are not taken soon to stabilize population growth, all our efforts in conservation will have little or no impact." Russell A. Mittermeier,   Conservation International

"In the last 200 years the population of our planet has grown exponentially, at a rate of 1.9% per year.  If it continued at this rate, with the population doubling every 40 years, by 2600 we would all be standing literally shoulder to shoulder." Prof. Stephen Hawking

"For those not numerically aware, humans have quadrupled in number in the 20th century.  That is referred to as 'plague phase' by biologists." Steve Kurtz

"I consider the dramatic growth in the world's  population to be the greatest challenge currently facing the environment....  the effects of this rapid increase are felt around the globe.  Starvation, deforestation and lack of clean water are just some of the problems...." Al Gore, U.S. Vice-President

"Pressures resulting from unrestrained population growth put demands on the natural world that can overhwelm any efforts to achieve a sustainable future.  If we are to halt the destruction of our environment, we must accept limits to that growth." World Scientists' Warning to Humanity, signed by 1600 senior scientists from 70 countries, including 102 Nobel Prize laureates

"It is not prudent to rely on science and technology alone to solve problems created by rapid population growth, wasteful resource consumption and harmful human practices." U.S. National Academy of Sciences and Royal Society of London, joint statement