Climate change is an ongoing and ever-present threat to the Earth and all organismsliving upon it. Unchecked industrialismand the burning of fossil fuels have resulted in the creation of harmful greenhouse gases. Human greed has led to massive deforestation and clearcuttingof forests to make way for farmland. Pollution clogs our rivers, lakes, and oceans. The point of no returnmay be fast approaching.
After decades of harmful actions, many governments and businesses are now scrambling to find ways to alleviate some of their destructive effects and reach net-zero emissions. One of the ways they proposed to reduce emissions was extensive tree-planting and reforestationefforts. Those plans never came to fruition, however, as the charity Oxfam issueddirewarnings against them. The area needed for a tree-planting project of this scale to successfully lower carbon emissions to net-zero is estimated at 1.6 billion hectares, *which is an area five times the size of India. Oxfam stated that the amount of land that would be required would intrude on the land presently needed to grow enough crops to feed the world’s expanding population.
Such a massive campaign of land reclamationcould contribute to a global disruption in agriculture, and cause food prices to rise by as much as 80% by 2050. In a world where millions of people are already going hungry, this could have disastrous results. By trying to save the planet, governments and businesses may cause many millions of people to die of starvation. This paradox perfectly illustrates the phrase “damnedif you do, and damned if you don’t.”
