Read the passage and answer the questions:
Environment and natural resources
According to the Human Development Report 2016 of the United Nations Development Programme, 663 million people in developing countries have no access to safe water and 2.4 billion have no access to sanitation, resulting in the death of more than three million children every year. The Club of Rome, a global think tank, published a book in 1972 entitled ‘Limits to Growth’, dramatising the potential depletion of the Earth’s resources against the backdrop of rapidly growing world population. The growing focus on environmental issues within the arena of global politics was firmly consolidated at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in June 1992. This was also called the Earth Summit. ‘Commons’ are those resources which are not owned by anyone but rather shared by a community. Cooperation over the global commons is not easy. There have been many path-breaking agreements such as the 1959 Antarctic Treaty, the 1987 Montreal Protocol, and the 1991 Antarctic Environmental Protocol. To address environmental issues, the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) provides that the parties should act to protect the climate system “on the basis of equity and in accordance with their common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities.”
What caused death of more than three million children every year in developing countries?
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 3
The correct answer is Option (3) → No access to safe water
Option (1) Rapid growth of world population — Incorrect. The passage names it only as the backdrop of Limits to Growth, not as a cause of the children’s deaths.
Option (2) Limits to growth — Incorrect. This is the title of the work published by the Club of Rome in 1972.
Option (3) No access to safe water — Correct. 663 million people in developing countries have no access to safe water and 2.4 billion have no access to sanitation, resulting in the death of more than three million children every year.
Option (4) Common use of resources — Incorrect. ‘Commons’ are resources shared by a community; the passage does not link them to these deaths.
NCERT (2025-26): “Environmental Concerns in Global Politics … According to the Human Development Report 2016 of the United Nations Development Programme, 663 million people in developing countries have no access to safe water and 2.4 billion have no access to sanitation, resulting in the death of more than three million children every year. Natural forests — which help stabilise the climate, moderate water supplies, and harbour a majority of the planet’s biodiversity on land— are being cut down and people are being displaced.…” |