Environment

The environment is everything around us. What we can see and feel around us can be termed as the environment. It is consist of living and non-living things that are interrelated to each other in a complex web of relationship. However, there are four scopes of the environment that have interaction with each other.

According to Boring,
” A person’s environment consists of a sum total of the stimulation which he receives from his conception until his death.”

According to Douglas and Holland,
” The term environment is used to describe in the aggregate, all the external forces, influences and conditions which affect the life, nature, behaviour and the growth, development and maturity of the living organisms.”

Scopes of Environment

There are four scopes of the environment. All of the scopes are interrelated to each other. If one scope becomes badly affected, on that time, all the other scopes are also be affected for that. The four scopes are given below:
1. Atmosphere
2. Hydrosphere
3. Lithosphere
4. Biosphere

All the scopes of the environment are described here-

1. Atmosphere

The atmosphere is one of the most important scopes of environment. It is a thin layer of gases which envelops the earth completely. This layer plays a crucial role by supplying the essential gases for all living beings. This gases of the atmosphere are circulated all the time according to a fixed pattern. The most important gases of this sphere are Nitrogen having 78% and the Oxygen having 21% of the total amount of gases. There are some biogeochemical cycles whose gaseous part is mainly maintained in this sphere. However, the Atmosphere can also be called the storehouse of gases.

2. Hydrosphere

‘Hydro’ means water and ‘sphere’ means region. From this concept, it is clear to us that the sphere having a huge amount of water can be termed as hydrosphere. It contains the earth’s water. It contains a lot of water but it is a matter of sorrow that we can not use all the water properly for some restrictions. Some amount of water can be found as saline. On the other hand, some amount of water is solid which can not be used by us instantly. About 2.97% of water is hard water or ice, found on the mountain slopes and in the polar regions of the earth. And about 97% of water is saline water found in the ocean and sea area. Therefore, 1% of the total amount of water is usable. We use the water for all of the necessary tasks such as household, agricultural and industrial activities. Overall, we can’t live a single day without the water.

3. Lithosphere

The other term we can use instead of the lithosphere is geosphere. The uppermost portion of the earth is called Soil or Crust. The soil is the most important part of our environment which is formed by the weathering actions including physical, geochemical, biological and biochemical actions. Soil plays a crucial role in plant growth. It is the storehouse of plant nutrient. All of the nutrients that are found in the soil is derived from rocks and minerals. The soil is a medium from where we get many kinds of foods for our everyday life. We depend on the lithosphere for our agricultural sector. By the way, Bangladesh is an agricultural country. We the people of Bangladesh highly depends on soil for developing the agricultural sector. The soil of our country is very fertile for what we are feeling blessed to Almighty.

4. Biosphere

The biosphere is a sensitive scope of the environment. ‘Bio’ means life. From the word ‘ Biosphere’, is totally transparent to us that this sphere is full of living beings. We the human being lives in this sphere. Most of life doesn’t live under the water or above the summit of mountains. They feel good to stay only a few meters of our earth surface. Here, photosynthesis plays a vital role. This biosphere totally depends on the one and only unique source of energy ‘sun’.

Conclusion

All of the spheres are highly interrelated to each other. Especially the biosphere has a great influence on all the other spheres of the environment. Even, the biosphere is also strongly influenced by all the other spheres. We the human being should be careful of taking care of our environment.

Author:
Md. Nayem Hasan Munna
Soil and Environmental Sciences,
The University of Barishal,
Barishal, Bangladesh.
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.nayemhasanmunna.info