Download Course name: Development studies An assignment

INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATIONS UNIVERSITY
SCHOOL OF …HUMANITIES………………..
Course name: Development studies
An assignment submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for
the BA Degree in …Development studies……………
Assignment No. 2
Student details: Helen Margaret Mwanza
Sin
: 1605111452
Lecturer’s Name:
Year:
2016
Question
: Increased pollution has also been cited as a
downside of economic growth. Discuss with practical example to
support you answer.
An increase in the physical quantity or in the quality of factors of production available to an
economy allows the economy to produce more goods and services. However, pollution causes
environmental degradation which in turn poses a negative impact on the aspect factors of
production. Pollution has also reached alarming stages .This severely threatens sustainable
economic growth. Arising from this point of view, this academic assignment
will discuss the
assertion that increased pollution contribute to negative economic growth.
In order to broaden its discussion, the paper is structured around three segments. Firstly, it brings
an outline on the definitions and general meaning and overview economic growth and pollution.
In the second section, the links between pollution and economic growth citing various practical
examples have been highlighted. In its last section, the paper evinces the on practical examples of
the subject and end by summing up the academic work.
It is imperative to give a detailed understanding of the terms economic growth .Miko (1998)
described economic growth as an increase in the total amount of production and wealth in an
economy. This implies that economic growth is the process through which an economy achieves
an outward shift in its production possibilities. Anything that increases the quantity or quality of
the factors of production available to the economy or that improves the technology available to the
economy contributes to economic growth. Economic growth and poverty reduction can be
constrained by several factors, among which is pollution.
Theories of economic growth have emphasized the role of human capital and the different
mechanics through which it may affect economic growth. The main theoretical approaches
highlighting the connection between human capital and economic growth are the augmented
Solow neo-classical approach and the new growth theories. The standard growth model developed
by Solow (1957) extends the basic production function by adding human capital as an extra input
in the aggregate production function, where the output of the macro economy is a direct function
of factor inputs: physical capital, labor and human capital, augmented by a term known as the
Solow residual, or total factor productivity, which drives technical progress or the productivity of
these factor inputs.
Donaldson (1973) defined pollution as the contamination of earth’s environment with materials
that interfere with human health, the quality of life, or the natural functioning of ecosystems.
Pollution exists whenever human activity generates a sufficient concentration of a substance in the
environment to cause harm to people or to resources valued by people. Many potentially harmful
substances are natural features of the environment, but they are not generally regarded as
pollutants.
Although some environmental pollution is a result of natural causes such as volcanic eruptions,
most is caused by human activities. Engelking (2008) stated that pollution exists in many forms
and affects many different aspects of Earth’s environment. He highlighted that point-source
pollution comes from specific, localized, and identifiable sources, such as sewage pipelines or
industrial smokestacks. Nonpoint-source pollution comes from dispersed or uncontained sources,
such as contaminated water runoff from urban areas or automobile emissions.
Air pollution is common and most pollutants are washed out of the air by rain, snow, fog, or mist,
but only after traveling large distances, sometimes across continents. As pollutants build up in the
atmosphere, sulfur and nitrogen oxides are converted into acids that mix with rain. This acid rain
falls in lakes and on forests, where it can lead to the death of fish and plants, and damage entire
ecosystems. Eventually the contaminated lakes and forests may become lifeless.
Globally, land contamination from solid waste disposal continues to grow as an environmental
problem. In Zambia, unsustainable utilization of the environment has affected the livelihoods of
people especially the poor .Although still a relatively new issue in environmental protection. For
example, United Nations Development Program (2015) indicated that in Zambia, waste
management particularly the management of municipal solid waste (domestic, trade and
manufacturing and hospital waste) has emerged as serious environmental concerns in urban areas.
The extraction and production processes of industries also have negative impacts on the
environment which principally relate to disposal of waste that generate both on and off-site
pollution. Notable polluters include chemical fertilizer plants, textile factories, edible oil factories,
tanneries and cement factories.
There is still localized air pollution, mainly felt in and around fertilizer manufacturers, cement
manufacturers, lime producers as well as around petroleum production facilities. Dust dispersal
from the desiccated surfaces or tailings impoundments from mine areas also continue to contribute
to air pollution. The Copper belt Province of Zambia can be an example of this aspect. High
emissions of Sulphur dioxide into the atmosphere from the mines have been blamed for
desertification a very large high density residential areas. This is against the hopes of growing
national economies and reduction of
poverty levels through agriculture productivity and
diversification. It can be argued that the, in this case pollution has an adverse effect of economic
growth.
With respect to global warming, greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide)
have significant implications for atmospheric warming and climate change. Despite low
greenhouse gas emissions, the threat of climate change looms is inevitable. UNDP (2016)
predicted temperature warming is expected to decrease rainfall in the range of 8 to 30 percent and
drought frequencies expected to be more pronounced in agro-ecological zones.
When the environment is poisoned, the degradation can instigate population movements into other
more fragile ecological settings, threatening the livelihood and health of those forced to move.
Second, the various threats can spread across a given country (with impoverished areas, for
example, upsetting the stability of more progressive sectors), or spill over into other regions
(through massive migration due to unemployment, the export of arms, the increased drain on
natural resources and so on) with as a result negative impact on global economy as a whole. For
instance, deforestation in the Sub- Sahara Africa has made migration of citizens to the Western
countries which have put up stringent measures in preventing immigration. One of the fears among
the Western counties is that of economic constraints of maintaining the immigrants.
In the complex global network in which humankind live, the breakdown of one element of the
system leads to breakdowns throughout the system, producing a vicious cycle of cause and effect.
Another major effect of pollution is the tremendous cost of pollution cleanup and prevention. The
global effort to control emissions of carbon dioxide, a gas produced from the combustion of fossil
fuels such as coal or oil, or of other organic materials like wood, is one such example. Mishra
(2014) argued that the cost of maintaining annual national carbon dioxide emissions at 1990 levels
is estimated to be 2 percent of the gross domestic product for developed countries. Pollution comes
with it social costs which are not borne by the producing firm but are incurred by others in society.
For example, when an oil refinery discharges its waste in the river causing water pollution, such a
pollution results in tremendous health hazards which involve costs to the society as a whole.
Just as the generation of
pollution makes many of the activities less expensive, the fact that
pollution increases many costs. Polluted rivers increase the cost of producing drinking water.
Polluted air requires has a huge cost on health care and to paint our buildings more often. Polluted
soils produce less food. The difficulty with pollution problems is that decision makers experience
the benefits of their own choices to pollute the environment, but the costs spill over to everyone
who breathes the air or consumes the water. These costs are examples of external costs which have
a bearing on economic growth. External costs produce one type of market failure and that market
failures lead to inefficiency in the allocation of resources.
In conclusion, it should be pointed out that economic growth can be affected by pollution. It has
been pointed out that pollution has whether air, soil or water have a negative bearing on factors of
production. Air pollution would negatively affect the labor force, water and soil pollution would
as well the sector such as agriculture which many countries have cited as areas to be diverted to
.Eventually, this will have a bearing on the economic growth of any country.
REFERENCE
Engelking, P,(2008). Pollution. Redmond, WA: Microsoft Corporation .
Mimiko O (1998). The State and the growth/Development Agenda: Africa and East/Asia in
Ibadan, Dekaal Publishers. 18: 163-166.
Mishra R.C.(2014) Psychology in human and social development: Lessons from diverse cultures
(pp. 235-293). New Delhi: Sage
United Nations Development Programme (2015) Country Report: Zambia,UNDP