A: Since the birth of mankind, human production and other activities have done many things beneficial to ecological balance, such as planting plants, domesticating animals, planting trees, improving soil and dredging rivers. However, human beings have also done many things to destroy the ecological balance. Due to the destruction of ecological balance caused by human activities, the adverse effects on human production and life are called environmental problems. Humans have different environmental problems in different historical stages.

In the early days of human development, people lived by gathering and hunting, and many species in one area were destroyed and their food sources were destroyed because of excessive gathering and hunting, and they were forced to migrate from one place to another. This is the environmental problem and solution in the fishing and hunting era.

Ten thousand years ago, in the Neolithic Age, with the progress of production tools, primitive agriculture and primitive animal husbandry appeared, which solved the environmental problems in the fishing and hunting era. However, in ancient times, the spontaneous development of agriculture, especially slash-and-burn agricultural technology, destroyed a large area of forests, worsened the environment in many places, destroyed the ecological balance, and some fertile fields that gave birth to brilliant human history and culture became barren. This is an environmental problem in agricultural society.

With the progress of science and technology and the development of industry, a large number of wastes are discharged into the environment, causing pollution of air, water, soil, animals and plants, reducing the purification ability of nature and the regeneration ability of natural resources, and environmental pollution in many places has developed into social hazards. This is an environmental problem in industrial society.