Locate the lines in text that support the title. 'The Ailing Planet'.
- The Brandt Commission's first report raised a significant question, if we were to leave our successors a scorched planet of advancing deserts, impoverished landscapes and ailing environment? Mr. Lester R. Brown in his book, The Global Economic Prospect, Pointed out that the earth's principal biological systems are four – fisheries, forests, grasslands and crop lands – in large areas of the world, human claims on these systems are reaching an unsustainable level. Several species now face the threat of extinction due to the destruction of tropical forests, which were called “the powerhouse of evolution” by Dr. Myers.
- It has been well said that forests precede mankind; deserts follow. We are loosing the ancient patrimony of tropical forests at the rate of 40 to 50 million acres a year. However, James Speth, the President of the World Resources Institute argued that it is much closer to an acre-and-a-half to a second. The growing use of dung for burning, deprives the soil of an important natural fertiliser. A five-fold increase in the the rate of forest planning is needed to cope with the expected fuel wood demand in the year 2000.
- There are measures that have been taken in concern of the growing cause towards our ailing planet. In 1972 the world's first nationwide Green party was founded in New Zealand. An understanding of that the earth itself is a living organism of which we are parts. The concept of sustainable development was popularised in 1987 by the World Commission on Environment and Development. We must heed to the words of Mr. Lester Brown, “We have not inherited this earth from our forefathers; we have borrowed it from our children.”