The director of the United Nations population division explains the effects of aging societies worldwide.
"Traditionally we had many
more children than
older people to take care of and
now it's switching
to a point where depending
on how you define the age groups.
The number of older people will eventually
be larger than the number of children, and this has implications for rather obvious reasons that you've
got a lot
of private and public arrangements to
care for people at older ages. There
are financial implications involved
especially for government budgets,
but there are also real concerns about the living conditions for those elderly people. What will that be
like and
will there be adequate social
protections to ensure that this
growing population of older people is
not impoverished."
The world's population is growing, but at its slowest pace in 70 years
mentioned in the United Nations' latest world population forecast. We are
generally living longer and healthier lives than previous generations. The
report also states that population growth will have huge impacts on our
economy, social welfare system, and our environment. The number of people on our
planet is now expected to reach 8 billion by November. It then will increase by
half a billion by the end of the decade, but in the meantime, birth rates have
been falling in many countries. In the coming years, global population growth
will be concentrated in just eight countries, the Democratic Republic of the
Congo, Egypt, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines, Tanzania, and India,
which will overtake China as the next most populous country on the planet. The
world population is also aging. The average person is expected to live 77 years
by 2050, up from 73 in 2019.
Discussion
on India's Population Dividend:
Next year India is going to overtake China.
By 2050 the gap between these two countries may widen. This can
help India in many ways, for example, India is pushing for greater
representation at the international level. Experts say concerns and demands may
carry more weight, especially at forums like the United Nations.
On the economic front, this makes
India the largest consumer market in the world that can invite huge investment.
Locally, population control has been a contentious electoral issue. Experts
have advocated a greater focus on reproductive rights and justice. This
includes improving girls' education, increasing the number of women in the workforce, and improving maternal health. Some of these efforts have been effective as the
population growth rate has slowed considerably, but there are many challenges
as the pandemic has reversed many of these gains. Many women have been forced
out of work and child marriages have increased. Experts say more awareness is
needed so that family planning becomes a matter of choice and not one of
opportunity and coercion.
The UN report suggests that 15 million
additional deaths by the end of 2021.
With an intermediate fertility scenario,
the United Nations estimates that the world population
will peak before the end of this century reaching 10.4 billion
people by 2086.
World population estimates are
compiled every two to three years from several different national censuses, and
these long-range estimates have not changed much over the years. We are
currently at a global population of approximately 7.9 billion. By 2100, as per
medium estimate, we could be at 10.4 billion. But this is also a very wide
range. There is a lot of uncertainty about future population trends and it has
a lot to do with the policies and programs that are in place in countries
around the world. The United Nations predicts that the possible future
population ranges from a low of 7 billion to a high of 14.8 billion by 2100, a
very wide range of possibilities for how the population could grow in the
future. This will have significant implications for the health and well-being
of people and the planet.
Looking at the immediate horizon,
there will be eight billion people on this planet by November.
Most of that growth is going to happen in India.
What
is the reason for the decline in population in India?
There are several factors. The
first is education. Girls are getting higher education. Second, the government
has invested in family planning, focusing on high-fertility districts in India.
In India, this is a very uneven situation where most of South India has reached
replacement level fertility. In fact, 24 states in India and six states in
northern India that had high fertility rates are facing declining fertility
rates as the government focuses on these high-fertility districts through its
new programming. Third, there is greater access to large numbers of
contraceptives. Every now and then a new contraceptive method is introduced.
Globally, the use of contraceptives has increased by six to twelve percent.
Within any country where it has increased, some modern contraceptive methods
have been introduced. Finally, earlier Muslims in India had a very high
fertility rate, but in the last two decades, especially in the last decade, it
has declined. And with the growing middle class, people’s importance of
girls' education has intensified. In addition, the marriage age is increasing
which also contributes to the decline in fertility. Besides, postponing and
spacing the first child also helps India curb population growth.
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India will likely overtake China as
the world's most populous country by next year,
which emboldens its bid for a permanent seat on the UN Security
Council.
What
political changes should we be looking for?
We must quickly analog the power of the population to hasten political power. What we have not brought here is the only continent in the world with significant population growth in the long term that is Africa. Because it is the only continent that still has a population greater than the replacement rate. The world's three largest countries, China, India, and the United States, have all recorded historic declines in their birth rates over the past few years. So, they will not challenge global population dominance, as they have in the past. Increasingly, it is going to focus on Africa.
Gender
Implications and Reproductive Rights:
UN Secretary-General António
Guterres' response to the population forecast was interesting. He said it is an
opportunity to celebrate health achievements that have extended life spans
worldwide and reduced child mortality. But he also criticized what he
called new attacks on women's right to access health services. Complications of
pregnancy and childbirth are among the leading causes of death for girls
between the ages of 15 and 19. Last month, the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, a landmark decision
that guaranteed abortion rights. Meanwhile, Poland has also restricted access
to the procedure, which shows that there are clearly wide inequalities when it
comes to reproductive rights.
How
does this translate into broader patterns of inequality?
One of the most interesting things
to think about is that when we're looking at population trends is to understand
what they tell us about persistent inequalities in society, whether it's
reproductive rights or Access to reproductive healthcare. This is still a huge
problem for many people, young women and girls around the world who want to
delay or avoid pregnancy, but do not have access to meaningful information and
services that allow them to achieve reproductive autonomy. It is a very basic
human right to have reproductive autonomy that millions of people around the
world still do not enjoy. It also tells us a lot about gender inequality and
the ways in which millions of girls don't go to school; in which women are not
empowered in the workforce or in the home to realize opportunities in their
lives that extend beyond motherhood. So, many of the things that continue to
accelerate population growth in Africa and around the world are indicative of a
lack of rights and inequalities, particularly in the health and gender spaces.
Situation
in Africa:
More than half of the projected growth by 2050
is expected to come from Africa.
With this, Nigeria is poised to become the fourth most populous
country on the planet.
Culturally, the ideal family size is larger than anywhere else.
The first thing, and recognised in
the UN report is that the data for Africa is not feasible. We don't really know
what is happening in Africa. But if the past is predictive, the trends we see
in other parts of the world to be incredibly rapid in terms of changing their
fertility rates primarily as a result of culture are going to be significant in
Africa as well. We have a hard time measuring that, but in places where we have
better data, for example, Kenya, and Nairobi are pretty close to the replacement
rate. So, the trends that are taking place everywhere in the world are
going to take place in Africa as well.
Some demographics in Africa are interesting.
In Nigeria, 70% of its 200 million people are currently under 30
years of age.
So the growth in population is also adding to the working-age
population.
Why is India still facing population growth?
The main reason India's fertility
is rising is that it has 360 million young people, many of whom are at or will
soon reach reproductive age. In India talking about the demographic dividend is
because it has a large youth population, but the problem is that the window to
exploit its benefit is small. The window for reaping the demographic dividend
is closer to 15 years or, on average, slightly longer in some states. We have
to invest in the education of the youth and provide more jobs to make the
demographic dividend a reality.
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Currently, there is a large number
of youth who are not skilled enough to take advantage of the employment
opportunities that exist. If we don't do something very soon about skill
training, skill development, and generating jobs for the youth, we will face a
demographic disaster. We also need more temporary methods and access to
contraception and ultimately sex education for young people. Not only rights
and justice, especially around reproductive information, but we also need
access to family planning services and temporary methods. India mainly focuses
on sterilization which is a permanent method. Whereas young people need access
to temporary methods because they do not plan families and need access to
contraception. So, the sooner India starts recognizing this reality, bringing
in schools those outside of school, and providing access to information and
inclusive sexuality education, the better.
The demographic dividend can either be an
opportunity for economic development
or possibly cause political conflicts.
Demographic
dividend: potential threat or just an opportunity?
One of the things that is really
important to understand about the demographic dividend is that it is realized
when fertility declines So that the working age proportion of the population
remains higher. In India's case, this is a short-term fertility decline,
requiring investment in education and employment opportunities. Further, the
demographic dividend doesn't just come from rapid population growth, but when
population growth is followed by a decline in fertility that results in a large
portion of the population entering the working age range and making it a
reality. There are many opportunities to achieve this. It requires huge
investments in contraceptive options, sexual education, and things that promote
gender equality, and reproductive health care.
Political Implications: Especially for the developing world?
What's really interesting to me in
listening to this conversation is how much this conversation is going to change
in the next 10 to 15 years because it's changing from the population bomb trend of
the 1970s. In particular, in the developed world it is going to be very
controversial how they promote childbearing. Because we now have many countries not identified in the report numbering 61 that are actually experiencing
population decline. Countries like Italy, for example, are losing 50,000 people
a year from their population. Japan loses about half a million people from its
population every year. Spain loses about 50,000 people from its population each
year. We have a whole series of countries in places like Eastern Europe where
the numbers are even more staggering. What we're going to see is a shift in the
conversation from addressing the challenges of the developing world to what
we're going to do in terms of managing populations in these countries that are
aging and shrinking. By 2030, the entire global baby boom population will be 65
or older, and we are not ready for that.
Climate
Change:
Looking
at resource constraints, obviously one of the important things is what we're
going to see in terms of climate change. Much of the population growth is occurring
in climate-vulnerable areas.
There’s
a debate about whether that's a good thing:
Any estimate that says it could be
between eight and fourteen million is not really a granted estimate. If you
look at the work that was published in The Lancet by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation done by a whole global series of demographers, it didn't
even come close to that number. So, there are a lot of questions about how the
UN is modeling this whole population momentum theory. There are many cultural
changes happening around the world. All of these things are actually
accelerating low fertility rates. Population growth will not be even close to
10.4 million. We're probably going to be between eight and nine billion people,
which is not far from where we are today. It's going to be a very different mix
of people who are going to be much more urban and much older than our
population on the face of Europe today.
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Views taken from interview given on
social media platforms:
Kathleen
Mogelgaard - President, Population Institute.
Poonam Muttreja
- Executive Director, Population Foundation of India.
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