What is Environmental Degradation?
Environmental degradation means a decrement in the quality of the environment. In this process, the environment loses self-regulatory quality.
As we know the environment has the following four components;
- Atmosphere
- Hydrosphere
- Lithosphere or soil
- Bio sphere
Degradation of air, water, soil, and the biosphere is combinedly known as environmental degradation and it is a great threat to the whole planet.
- Atmospheric degradation happens due to increasing air pollution and deforestation activities.
- Hydrosphere degradation happens due to improper waste handling and discharging of polluted water in major water bodies.
- Soil degradation means the decline of biophysical nutrition from soils and reduction of soil depth due to misuse or erosion.
- Biodegradation means a decline in bio-diversity, natural resources, and other biotic resources.
Degradation of the environment happens in each component of the environment by both natural and human-made activities.
- Natural causes such as drought, sea storms, volcanic eruption, etc.
- Human-made causes such as deforestation, desertification, pollution led by urbanization, and economic development.
We have already discussed the environmental pollution cause and the consequences that degrade our environment. We will discuss how deforestation and degradation and soil erosion cause environmental degradation in the next articles.
Try to solve the following questions:
- Explain the impact of economic development on environmental degradation in India. ( UPSC 2016,200 words, 15 marks)
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