Ozan İpek - 1

Overpopulation of urban areas has led to numerous problems. Identify one or two serious ones and suggest ways that governments and individuals can tackle these problems.

The human population has gone up over thousands of years, and illness, wars, or disasters have not been able to stop this uptrend. Hence, new treatments, developments of new technologies, and new models of economics have expedited the growth rate of the population. Now, the world population has become more than 7 billion, and a high percentage of the population is living in urban areas for welfare. This situation has created some problems for cities such as unemployment and air pollution. These problems and solutions for them will be discussed in this article. 

First, people who migrate to metropolises to find better chances face bitter reality. In reality, despite opportunities, population and opportunities are not balanced. For this reason many people can not find any job in urban areas. For instance, in İstanbul, the biggest city in Turkey, the population has already reached 14 million but the job potential is lower than the population, as a result of which lots of people can not handle problems. This fact inevitably affects citizens' standards of living. Second, millions of people use their cars for transportation in cities, which creates a huge problem with the quality of air. This trouble leads to air pollution and affects public's health negatively.

Fortunately, there are some solutions for these problems. These solutions include two sides which are the solutions that can be offered by both governments and individuals. Firstly, the state needs to create new job opportunities such as establishing new factories for the citizens. In this way, the members of the public can tackle the economic conditions of the cities. The other side of the solution is individuals who should settle back in small cities because the resources of the metropolis are not enough for everyone. However, there are a lot of jobs in rural areas. Therefore, if they move to rural areas, they can tackle unemployment. Furthermore, the remedy of air pollution is encouraging renewable energy sources by both individuals and government. If citizens prefer the politicians who advocate green energy, air pollution problem will come under control.

In conclusion, population explosion creates some problems in urban areas but both government and individuals should come together to cope with them. Establishing new employment areas by the state and the migration to villages by the citizens can be solutions for unemployment ıssue. Also, supporting green energy by both of them can be a definite solution for the air pollution problem. Consequently, only a combination of the two sides can solve these serious problems.