Population, development, and the environment: trends and key issues in the developed countries

The quantitative relationship between environmental degradation (pollution) and the factors that influence it can be expressed by the identity: Pollution = population x (good/population) x (pollution/good), where "affluence" is expressed as good/population and the technology of production as pollution/good. Annual data for the emission of carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxides from mobile sources and for the use of pesticides and inorganic nitrogen fertilizer from agriculture, for the member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the United States, were analyzed to determine the relative change in the three factors over the period 1970-1987. In each case the considerable variation in pollutant emissions among the different countries is most closely related to the concomitant change in the technology factor (pollution/good). In contrast, there is much less variation among the countries in the population and "affluence" factors, which are consequently uncorrelated with the variation in pollutant emissions. The data show that the change in production technology is by far the most important of the several factors responsible for changes in pollution emission.