Don't Panic About Immigration - worry about how we waste natural resources

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Squandered Resources More a Concern Than Depopulation
From Post Global Blog, Washington Post
Dr. Eli Ettefagh

The Current Discussion: Australia is suffering from a drought of men - about 100,000 of them, most of whom have gone overseas to travel and work. China has the opposite problem - a shortage of women. Which is the more worrisome problem? Should we be worrying about a "de-population bomb?"

This is not a world issue, but a question for many countries in their national, tribal-minded assessment of immigration policies. Australia is a young nation and a land of immigrants. But it has recently changed course to experiment with membership in the Xenophobes Club and closed its doors to immigration. In turn, the relatively small population of about 21 million people (about half the population of Spain) has reached an economic saturation point. Now, Australians search for jobs and opportunities elsewhere by taking advantage of the new global economy. This is merely the age old story of migration and the search for economic and natural resources that historically led to the Silk Road, Columbus and his maritime adventures and colonial wars over spices, gold and minerals.

Flows of migrant workers usually present a challenge to planners that wish to have a steady rate of population replacement, within old national definitions, and try hard to maintain overall balances in infrastructure demand, taxes and expenditures, schools, housing, pensions or other social services. America, a particular example, has managed to grow its basic economic scenario of demand and consumption by accepting immigrants and has reduced the overall labor costs of a productive economy by importing labor from abroad.

However, China is a unique case. It had a one child policy for an entire generation with an aim to reduce the population count. It is also a country that, with its diverse ethnic groups, has seen internal migration -- the number of people is roughly equal to the population of the United States -- from the north to the south. Chinese, like Australians, search for skilled and semi-skilled job opportunities at home and abroad as they compete with Thais, Filipinos, Bangladeshis, Pakistanis or Indians for service sector, construction or mining jobs in the Middle East and Africa, or for higher wages in Japan or Singapore.

It is difficult to apply a simplified measure of "depopulation" to China. Many classic evaluation methods generally fail to apply to China with its particular dynamics. However, one could ponder that, in some 20 to 30 years, there will be an imbalance and the ratio of the retired vs. working Chinese will be high. This is already visible in Russia, Romania and Poland today where younger people have migrated abroad and where there has been a net negative rate of population growth. None is a traditional receiver of, or a destination for, immigrants in large numbers nor are they open to the ethnic diversification seen in U.S., Canada, U.K. or even Germany and Austria. This has been an alarming scenario for Russia as its vast land mass is spread across ten time zones.

There is also a noticeable depopulation of indigenous people in mostly Protestant northern Europe and Scandinavia (but not, for example, in Catholic lands such as Italy or Spain). Unlike countries with Christian Orthodox traditions, Protestants have a more liberal immigration policy and tend to check negative population growth with immigrants from eastern or southern Europe or from other lands as far away as Turkey, Morocco or northern Iraq. France, for example, has encouraged replacement of its indigenous population by offering tax incentives so families can afford to have children. In Austria, Switzerland and Sweden, foreign born or foreign surnames make up to 20% of the legal residents in the country. More than half of all Bosnians or Iraqi Kurds, for example, live in Europe. The removal of borders within the European Union and the freedom of movement by E.U. citizens aids immigrants in search of better jobs.

Concurrently, other countries such as India, Brazil, Mexico or Indonesia hardly worry about depopulation where the population growth rate in mostly rural areas is unabated.

In balance, depopulation is a by-product of migration and not an explosive issue for modern, globalized humankind. The population of the planet is growing and diverse nations have never been in closer contact or lived with greater access to the tools of prosperity (when measured in relative terms of consumption and use of natural resources). Immigration will continue to be an aspect of this close connection.

The mother of all clear and present worries is about natural resources and not the issue of depopulation. The question is whether the planet can sustain the current rate of squandering its natural resources as global warming and a severe shortage of clean, fresh water will definitely lead to a much different, unfortunate kind of depopulation bomb. Alas, none of us are considering that problem with the serious attention that it deserves.


Posted by Ali Ettefagh on September 14, 2008 11:55 AM
Ali Ettefagh
Tehran, Iran
Dr. Ali Ettefagh serves as a director of Highmore Global Corporation, an investment company in emerging markets of Eastern Europe, CIS, and the Middle East. He is the co-author of several books on trade conflict, resolution of international trade disputes, conflicts in letters of credit, trade-related banking transactions, sovereign debt, arbitration and dispute resolutions and publications specific to the oil and gas, communication, aviation and finance sectors. Dr. Ettefagh is a member of the executive committee and the board of directors of The Development Foundation, an advisor to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, and an advisor to a number of European companies. Dr. Ettefagh speaks Persian (Farsi), English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Arabic and Turkish.

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