The world is heading for wildly uneven population swings in the next 45 years, with many rich countries “downsizing” during a period in which almost all developing nations will grow at breakneck speed, according to a comprehensive report released Tuesday by leading US demographers with the Washington-based Population Reference Bureau.
While the worlds few developed countries are expected to grow about 4 percent to over 1,2 billion, population in developing countries could surge by 55 percent to more than 8 billion. Asia and Africa could account for 90 percent of the growth alone, according to the World Bank press review Wednesday.
World population will likely reach 9,3 billion by mid-century from 6,3 billion today. The report predicts that at least an extra 1.000 million will be living in the worlds poorest African countries by 2050 and India will leapfrog China to become the worlds most populous country.
Africa and Asia will inevitably be transformed. Western Asian nations are expected to gain about 186 million people by 2050 and sub-Saharan African countries more than one billion people.
The changes, considered inevitable given present trends, will transform geo-politics and fundamentally affect the worlds economies, peoples lifestyles and global resources.
The population changes are causing growing alarm among experts, who believe sustained growth in developing countries can only be managed with economic help from rich countries.
Furthermore, climate change and ongoing land degradation are widely expected to encourage further widespread movements of people and pressure for migration away from rural areas towards cities and richer countries.
Former World Bank economist Herman Daly believes globalization and the uncontrolled migration of cheap labor could put potentially catastrophic pressures on local communities and national economies.
However, a separate report, to be published soon by the Washington-based Worldwatch Institute, will argue that fertility rates in poor countries could drop if there is a world fuel crisis. The think-tank says people usually have as many children as they think they can afford, and the motivation to have fewer comes from anticipating hard times ahead.
Increases in food production per hectare, it will say, have not kept pace with increases in population, and the planet has virtually no more arable land or fresh water to spare. As a result, per-capita cropland has shrunk by more than half since 1960, and per capita production of grains, the basic food, has been falling worldwide for 20 years.
Senior demographer Carl Haub of the Population Reference Bureau notes that fertility rates are highly uneven in the developing world, with Thailand currently averaging 1,7 births per female as opposed to eight births for Niger.
He says fertility rates will likely decline in Africa as they have done elsewhere. But he admits that it is impossible to say precisely how fast and how far the rate will drop. Of one thing he is certain:
the median age difference between the industrialized world and the developing world will continue to grow, with European and North American populations becoming more “aged” as a whole, while developing nations become more “youthful”. This, he says, will have important economic consequences for the future.
– There is a real shift in population, not just in terms of numbers, in total size, but in age. The youthful population today is more and more becoming that of the developing countries. These are the people who are setting up families, household formation. They are buying things. That is where I think the more vibrant markets are going to be, he predicted.
Meanwhile, Haub highlighted the different plight faced by developed and developing countries by using Nigeria and Japan as examples of two countries heading in different demographic directions.
– Clearly, Nigeria has millions of young people to educate and employ. Vast investments are needed to provide a higher quality of life for Nigerias growing population, he said. – Japan must find ways to take care of more and more retired people and still maintain an adequate work force, added he.
The projections assume that HIV/AIDS prevalence in Africa, which is already declining in 14 out of 38 affected countries, will peak in 10 to 15 years, Haub said.
The population trends could change further depending on how successful doctors are in treating AIDS infections and reducing infant mortality rates and, how prevalent contraceptive use and family planning become in developing nations.
Kilde: www.worldbank.org
