ESSAY: ENVIRONMENT The people of Mesopotamia, Egypt, India, and China were dependent on the environment for the success of their civilizations. To grow food, the people of these civilizations needed fertile land. They needed water from rivers to irrigate their fields.

Any changes in the environment could have negative effects on the communities of early civilizations. For this project, you will read about how changes in the environment affected the people of early civilizations. You will then be asked to think about how the environment affects us today.