Environment
Current environmental issues for Tunisia include:
- Toxic and hazardous waste - disposal is ineffective and presents human health risks
- Water pollution from raw sewage
- Limited natural fresh water resources
- Deforestation
- Overgrazing
- Soil erosion
- Desertification
Tunisia is a party to the following international agreements: Biodiversity, Climate Change, Climate Change-Kyoto Protocol, Desertification, Endangered Species, Environmental Modification, Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Marine Dumping, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution (MARPOL 73/78) and Wetlands. Tunisia has signed, but not ratified the Marine Life Conservation agreement.
Tunisia, like other North African countries, has lost much of its prehistoric biodiversity due to the ongoing expanding human population; for example, until historic times there was a population of the endangered primate Barbary Macaque, Macaca sylvanus. The Monk Seal is now extirpated from Tunisia.
Read more about this topic: Geography Of Tunisia
Famous quotes containing the word environment:
“Modern man’s capacity for destruction is quixotic evidence of humanity’s capacity for reconstruction. The powerful technological agents we have unleashed against the environment include many of the agents we require for its reconstruction.”
—George F. Will (b. 1941)
“Maturity involves being honest and true to oneself, making decisions based on a conscious internal process, assuming responsibility for one’s decisions, having healthy relationships with others and developing one’s own true gifts. It involves thinking about one’s environment and deciding what one will and won’t accept.”
—Mary Pipher (20th century)
“We learn through experience and experiencing, and no one teaches anyone anything. This is as true for the infant moving from kicking to crawling to walking as it is for the scientist with his equations. If the environment permits it, anyone can learn whatever he chooses to learn; and if the individual permits it, the environment will teach him everything it has to teach.”
—Viola Spolin (b. 1911)