Lesson 3: What is the impact on people when resources are affected?

Lesson 3: What is the impact on people when resources are affected?

The poor are more vulnerable than the rich to changes in the environment.

For homework, split the students into two groups. One will research life in Bangladesh (a Southern country); one will look at life in New Zealand (a Northern country). You can choose to use the matrix on the following page, or for older students ask them to write a short essay on their findings. The idea is to research the four areas listed in the retrieval chart: water, food, employment, leisure.

Useful words to search the Internet with are: Bangladesh (by itself) as well as teamed with daily life and economy. (This activity could also be done in class, during a period in which the students have computer access).
Before starting the activity talk about the division in the world between rich and poor countries. Why do development organisations now call rich and poor countries Northern and Southern countries? Using the map in Attachment 5, discuss the following:

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  Why is New Zealand a Northern country?
  
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  Who else in the South is also a ‘Northern Country’?
  
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  Why do we choose to use these words instead of First World/Third World, developed/developing?
  

In class, pair up the students so they can compare their answers and fill in the other side of their retrieval chart.

In pairs, students discuss how the destruction of natural resources creates a larger or smaller impact depending on your lifestyle. Use the first topic of water as an example and then have them talk about the other three areas mentioned on the chart.

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  What would someone in New Zealand do if you took away or ruined their water source? (The answer could be a drive down to the supermarket to buy bottled water instead or installing a rainwater tank).
  
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  How big an impact would this have on a New Zealander’s life?
  
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  What would someone in Bangladesh do if you took away or ruined their water source? (This might mean they have to find a different spring/river).
  
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  How big an impact would this have on a Bangladeshi’s life?
  
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  Talk about the other areas as well, what resources could you remove that would impact food, employment or leisure? Compare the differences in how both countries would cope and, more importantly, what the consequences would be.
  

Using the cause and effect understanding from previous lessons, discuss some of the reasons a natural resource in Bangladesh or NZ might change or disappear e.g.:

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  water sources becoming polluted could be a result of factory pollution
  
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  soil to grow vegetables could disappear as a result of too much rain, devastating floods or tsunamis
  
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  clean air could be ruined as a result of too many house fires in winter.
  

Lesson 4: Carbon Footprints

Key idea:

That the poor have among the lightest carbon footprints in the world.

Activity 1: My Carbon Footprint

What is a carbon footprint?

See Attachment 3 for a brief explanation.
Either as a class if you have access to the Internet, or individually as homework, or in an IT lesson, students work out their own carbon footprint using: www.myfootprint.org or any other calculator on the Internet.
What makes the most difference to your carbon footprint? Change some of the values looking at what will lower your footprint a lot, or a little.
Work out the carbon footprint of someone living in Bangladesh.

The average ecological footprint of a New Zealander has been calculated at 7.6-8.7 ha/person. For Bangladesh it is 0.5 ha/person. For Australia it is 9.0 ha/person, and for China it is 1.2 ha/person. The world average is about 2.8 ha/person.

Activity 2: Bangladesh in Focus

Talk about the results:

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  from what you have learnt about people living in Bangladesh, why do you think their carbon footprint is lower than a New Zealander’s?
  
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  read the article in Attachment 4 as a class. It is about the fears for Bangladesh and the potential impact they will experience from climate change.
  
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  is it fair that Bangladesh (a country with a low carbon footprint) will experience the impact of climate change before the countries creating the most pollution? What could we do to try and make the situation fairer?
  

Activity 3: Paragraph Writing

Write a paragraph for homework about Environmental Justice.

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  Do you think it is fair that the countries with the lowest carbon footprint are being impacted the most? Justify your answer.
  
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  Who do you think the responsibility lies with to change their behaviour and what could they change?
  

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