World's Views of Air, Water Quality Highlight Challenges.
Byline: Steve Crabtree
Synopsis: People's satisfaction with their air and water quality tends to be lower in less economically developed regions of the world, highlighting the challenge facing countries with rapid economic growth.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued dire warnings this week that governments need to make far-reaching changes if they want to avoid an environmental catastrophe by as early as 2030.
These changes won't come easily, especially for countries where rapid industrialization and urbanization come with a cost to the environment. Gallup's global research indicates that residents' satisfaction with their air and water quality tends to be lower in less economically developed regions, and highlights the challenge facing countries that are experiencing rapid economic growth.
In 2017, three in four adults (77%) worldwide said they were satisfied with the quality of air in their city or area, while somewhat fewer, seven in 10 adults (70%), said they were satisfied with the quality of water.
However, results vary substantially by region. Regionally, satisfaction with both aspects of the environmental is highest at more than 90% of residents in Australia and New Zealand. By contrast, residents of post-Soviet states are least likely to be satisfied with air quality at 67%, while satisfaction with water quality is lowest among sub-Saharan Africans at 55%.
Residents' views of air quality and water quality are often similar to each other, especially those in more economically developed regions where satisfaction with both is usually relatively high.
However, there are notable exceptions. In some small, industrialized and highly urbanized countries and regions, residents are much less likely to be satisfied with air quality than water quality. Several of these are in East Asia, including South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong.
On the other hand, residents are far less likely to be satisfied with water quality than air quality in some of the world's least developed countries, those with poor infrastructure and large rural populations -- including Gabon, Central African Republic, Kenya and Sierra Leone.
Residents of wealthy northern European countries and Australia and New Zealand are most likely in the world to be happy with the air quality in their city or area, with satisfaction rates exceeding 90% in most cases. Worldwide, however, a country's per-capita GDP is only a weak predictor of its...
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