ETCETERA / Index

Years at current rates of emigration and immigration until half Britain's current genetic strain will have been replaced: 95

Juggernaut-loads of polluting organic hydrocarbons released by the worldwide automobile painting industry each year: 15,652

Miles British cars and light goods vehicles which cannot run on unleaded petrol would stretch parked nose-to-tail: 14,657

Used vehicle tyres dumped per day in the UK: 57,000

Grants to nature conservation bodies per working day by English Nature: pounds 994

Declared 1991 working-day's turnover of the private company of the former deputy director- general of the BBC, John Birt: pounds 627

Proportion by which an American's water consumption exceeds a Ghanaian's: 60:1

DDT and related DDE pesticide residues in the fat of Dutch citizens in 1968 (mg/kg fat): 4.3

In 1986: 2.45

Ex-Soviet nuclear-powered submarines awaiting decommissioning: 93

Percentage of UK newsprint which was recycled fibre in 1991: 28

Years before stratospheric ozone layer over Great Britain is completely destroyed, at current rate: 87

Sources: RM/Home Office/Sara-Jane Robins; Euromonitor/ICI (360,000t); RM/MORI/Lex Services (38 per cent or 7,739,042 at 10ft long); RM/Welsh Office/DTI; Dept of the Environment (1991/2); RM/Companies House; Croissance; Euromonitor; ibid; Channel 4/Dr Alexei Yablokov; Dept of the Environment; RM/Dept of the Environment (8 per cent per decade).