The Ecosystem Approach by David Waltner-Toews

Author:David Waltner-Toews
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: SCI020000, Science/Life Sciences/Ecology, SCI012000, Science/Chaotic Behavior in Systems
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Published: 2008-07-20T16:00:00+00:00

Figure 11.2 Map of the Great Lakes Basin—political boundaries and major cities. Map credit: National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory (www.glerl.noaa.gov/pubs/photogallery/albums/Misc/pages/1094.htm)

A Socioeconomic Perspective

The population of the GLB in 1991/1992 was over 39 million, an increase of 5.7 percent over the preceding decade. Urban land use accounted for 1 percent of the total basin area, mostly in the south, where 80 percent of the Basin’s population lived in only seventeen cities (Jarvis et al. 1996). The rest of the population lived in smaller cities and in rural areas.

Agriculture is an economically important industry in all GLB jurisdictions, with its eight American states (including portions outside the GLB) in 1991–1992 producing 30 percent of all U.S. sales in agriculture, for a return of $45 billion USD. Major products included corn, soybeans, and milk. There were 5 million hectares in agricultural production in Ontario (all of these in the GLB except the eastern tip of the province), and these produced 22 percent of all Canadian agricultural revenue. There were nearly 204,000 farms in the GLB in 1991–1992, of which 29 percent (59,000) were Canadian. Proximity to urban centers is typical of GLB farms, with 64 percent of farmland within 50 km of a major urban center (Jarvis et al. 1996).

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