Today, Easter Island is famous for its massive heads statues scattered around its coast. These statues were the cause of the end of the civilization of the inhabitants of Easter Island- the Rapa Nui people. The Rapa Nui people cleared countless trees to build their society. They used the slash and burn farming method which involves in the cutting and burning of huge of trees in the forest to create more fertile fields that can produce more food. They cut down trees to build shelters and canoes. They built a significant amount of massive statues that they believed embodies the spirits of their ancestors. To transport these statues across the island, they used trunks as rollers and levers, these trunks needs to be frequently replaced. Their population increased drastically, within 800 years, their population growth to 20000. To sustain this rate of population growth, more food needs to be produced, which means burning more forests and cutting even more trees. Within a century, half of the bird species and most of the shellfish species are extinct. When they find out that they ran out of most of their resources, it was too late for them to escape from the island because there are no more wood to built canoes. Desperately attempting to survive, the islanders started to practice cannibalism. Shortly after, the civilization ended and all the Rapa Nui people died. This is a lesson from history, when resource depletion led to a civilization's downfall. But if we take a closer look to the current international society’s management of natural resources we will find out that it is extremely similar to that of the Rapa Nui people on Easter Island. We are facing problems of over fishing, mineral depletion, and oil depletion...etc. The increasing demand for resources is cause by the growing population and the growing per capita consumption rate.
This info-graphic gives us information on the global over-fishing. Our fish stock has dropped 90 percent since 1950, 80 percents of the world’s fishing is exploited, 30 percent of the fish stock has already collapsed. 1.2 billion people depend on fish as their main source of proteins. At this rate of consumption, fishery is not sustainable. According to the United Nations, world fishery is expected to collapse in 2050.
This chart from the British Geological Survey shows the proved world reserve of some important natural resources and the projection on how long they will last us. We can see from the chart that most natural resources will be depleted within 50 years. It is true, that some metals such as aluminum and lead are highly recyclable, and that more mineral reserves can be discovered in the future. It is true that our resources might last us a few decades longer than the projection shows. However, it is a fact that we are consuming most of our resources faster than they are created. This means that we will eventually deplete these resources, it is just a matter of time. It should be noted that even though the international society’s management of natural resources is extremely similar to that of the Rapa Nui, we will not extinct because of the lack of resources because some of us will be capable to live without the resources that we are depleting. However, our population might face a major decrease as food production will drop drastically without resources such as oil. The majority of people will need to shift to a more agricultural based lifestyle and live a more frugal lifestyle that doesn't rely on those resources as much.