Many thanks to Mark O’Connor for this good news from Australia.
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Mark reports:
The new PM Julia Gillard’s views on population growth were not known till this morning (27 June) when she is reported as rejecting the notion of “Big Australia”. She promises a significant reduction in immigration, and has renamed the Minister for Population Tony Burke (whom Rudd appointed a few months ago in what was probably a piece of window dressing). In future he is to be called ” the Minister for Sustainable Population”.

Members of Sustainable Population Australia remain cautious, with comments on Australia’s on-line population forum including “At last a Prime minister who can read opinion polls” and “She talks the talk. It won’t be long until we see whether she can walk the walk…” and “Might be rhetoric, but good to see some change in the stance.”
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There is less than a month until the September 7th deadline for submissions for the 31st Annual Global Media Awards.

This year marks the 31st Anniversary of the GMA. The program is a global competition that encourages participation from individuals and organizations in all continents and regions. This year’s December award dinner, which will be held in San Francisco, will honor a wide range of journalists and media for their outstanding coverage of population, family planning and reproductive health issues. The awards serve to stimulate high standards of journalism and full and accurate reporting on issues related to population. By encouraging better coverage of population and development issues, the GMAs serve to educate policymakers, opinion leaders and the general public about the impacts of population growth and the benefits of ensuring that all women have access to family planning and reproductive health services.
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Congratulations to Clifford Garrard of Population Institute Canada for his letter to the Ottawa Citizen. It responds to a call by Ian MacLeod of the Canwest News Service for Canada to increase its population to 100 million to give it more clout in world affairs. See a second letter from Ambassador Martin Collacott below. The MacLeod piece is reprinted below the letters.

It’s no joke that size matters in a nation’s quality of life

The Ottawa Citizen June 19, 2010
Re: Canada should aim for 100M population , June 14.

While a saucy double entendre query of whether “size matters” might produce snickers, the proposition that Canada’s population should be encouraged through immigration to grow to 100 million is no laughing matter. “Size” does matter. And the consequences are profoundly far-reaching and important.
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Thanks to Dave Simcox for this review of the book by Joel Kotkin that welcomed the prospect of the US population growing by another 100 million.

See https://docs.google.com/a/populationmedia.org/leaf?id=0B5F-idWfw7TeZDZkNzNkMjAtZjEzMC00ZTZhLTk4ZDktZmE4YmM1MDllYWZh&hl=en&authkey=CPf6lPAM

Thanks to Joe Bish for this article.
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At the nexus of the Democrats’ two most urgent policy priorities – reducing CO2 emissions and immigration reform that includes amnesty for 12 million illegal immigrants – lies an uneasy reality: Enactment of the latter may prove to be the key obstacle to achieving the former.

The economic and national security implications of open borders have been examined in depth. Less study, however, has been devoted to the possible environmental impact of immigration.

People migrate to the United States to improve their standard of living. But the liberal wish of immigration amnesty may have deleterious effects on the environment, as millions of people from developing countries settle down in, or are encouraged to move to, the world’s largest energy-consuming country and quickly embrace all the CO2-causing ways of the world’s richest economy.

For full article, visit:
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0610/38006.html

Many thanks to Karen Shragg for this poem, which she wrote on Earth Day.

The Earth Laughing by Karen I. Shragg

I woke up on this beautiful
Earth Day morning and heard
the Earth laughing
Her lilacs were shaking
Her tulips were full of dew from her tears
Dropped of a nervous laugh
Not a joyful one
A laugh that comes from a place
of disbelief
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Two documentary films are being made on population issues, as described below.

Joyce Johnson and Chris Fauchere of Tiroir A Films (http://www.tiroirafilms.net/), makers of the Great Squeeze (http://www.thegreatsqueeze.com/), are now producing a second film on population issues. Pushing Ten Billion (working title) will be a holistic approach to the environmental effects caused by overpopulation in the US and abroad. The film will unfold the many layers of today’s population crisis and its relationship to most of our modern environmental and social problems. By going beyond the obvious, it exposes the different forces that combine to keep this issue under the rug. The film explores concrete, innovative and holistic approaches to solving the problem. It includes engaging interviews with experts in the field of reproductive health, economics, religion, and the social sciences. What sets the movie apart are the compelling real-life stories of women and families around the world who put a face on this important and overlooked issue.
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(From Zunia)

A Reproductive Health Communication Model That Helps Improve Young Women’s Reproductive Life and Reduce Population Growth

PRACHAR, a reproductive health communication model developed and tested in rural Bihar, India, has been found to be successful in (a) delaying age at marriage and onset of childbearing, (b) increasing contraceptive use for spacing of pregnancies, and (c) generating the most positive impact on contraceptive use among the socioeconomically least advantaged. This paper presents the results of an exercise that estimates the impact of implementing the PRACHAR model in the reproductive health and family planning programs in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. It shows that implementing PRACHAR in just these two states could result in the national population growing by 64 million fewer people.

To download the report, visit: http://www.pathfind.org/site

The West African country of Mali has among the highest fertility rates in the world (6.6, according to the 2006 Demographic and Health Survey). The DHS showed that only 6.9% of married women currently use modern methods of contraception. The top reasons for non-use included: personal opposition to family planning (22.1%), wanting as many children as possible (17.6%), male opposition (9.0%), and not knowing a method (8.6%). Among non-users, 33.7% say they intend to use contraception in the future, while 54.5% do not.
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Alternet conducted an interview with Bill Ryerson regarding the work of Population Media Center.
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AlterNet / By Daniela Perdomo

Strange But True: How Soap Operas Might Save Us From Overpopulation
Earth reached its human capacity in the 1980s. Our planet is in crisis, and Bill Ryerson is using media to change behaviors that contribute to global overpopulation.

June 8, 2010

Global warming, food and water crises, even international conflict — you can trace all these societal and environmental problems to overpopulation. Experts believe that Earth reached its population capacity in the 1980s, meaning we now consume natural resources at a rate much higher than they can be replenished. And of course, as we take away natural resources, we’re adding a slew of unnatural, toxic matter into the mix that brings about a host of other problems.
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