46 



a safer form of energy from nuclear fusion are proceeding but the prob- 

 lem is one of greatT technical difficulty and the estimates of time to 

 achieve success range from 20 to 50 years. Half a century of uncon- 

 trolled nuclear proliferation as a consequence of supplying electricity 

 to mankind is a fearsome prospect. 



Populations 



The ultimate concern of all governments, in terms of both ends ;md 

 means, is people. Of growing concern is the relationship between total 

 available resources and population in the entire world, but especially in 

 the most populous regions and those in which the rate of population 

 increase is sharpest. Populations are significant in relation to resources 

 of arable land and materials, ability to buy food, levels of consumption 

 of all goods, rates at which environmental pollution occurs, and ability 

 to extend governance. As populations increase, problems worsen in all 

 these categories unless means are found to exert strong positive con- 

 trols or motivations. In an interdependent world, population problems 

 in any country have effects on all countries. Rates of population 

 increase of different countries in the contemporary world tend to be in 

 inverse proportion to achieved levels of development. Technology is 

 available to feed large increases in populations as well as to control the 

 rates of increase, but the enlistment of technology toward either 

 purpose requires institutional support which is generally inadequate. 

 Many forces are at work that cause population increases while few 

 forces have been devised to inhibit population growth in poor coun- 

 tries, other than food deprivation as a consequence of food/population 

 unbalance. International tensions resulting from population pressures 

 are regarded as serious and worsening but international agreement on 

 the resolution of the problem is lacking. The dilemma facing the world 

 is that governments of poor countries call for aid from developed 

 countries to secure the rights of their citizens to living standards 

 achieved by developed countries, but cannot reconcile these expecta- 

 tions with their practical impossibility in the face of uninhibited 

 increases of populations. 



Food 



As with population control, the limiting factor on food supply is not 

 primarily technological but institutional. Wider exploitation of well- 

 established technology of plant genetics, fertilization, storage, process- 

 ing, and marketing could treble or quadruple the available food supply 

 of the world. But the institutional remedies for the almost inevitable 

 increase of famine conditions in the closing quarter of the 20th century 

 must deal with food production and distribution as only one ingredient 

 in a pattern of development that encompasses health and education, 

 nonagricultural employment opportunities in urban and rural area-, 

 stable currencies and' international exchanges. Land management 

 reform, and stable institutions of government able to administer 

 effective tax and investment programs. Failing achievement of these 

 conditions, the poor countries will need to rely increasingly on imported 

 supplies of food of which the United States is the leading exporter. 

 For the United Slate, the options include (a) short-term economic 

 advantage by sales to the best market, (b) stern compulsion on the 

 poor countries to effect reforms by deliberate choice of markets to 

 reward the countries that do so, ami (c) compassionate doling out of 

 dwindling food reserves to populations on the basis of relative extremes 

 of need. Averting so painful a decision rests not with the United States 



