The United Nations says that the world’s population reached 8 billion on November 15, 2022. According to World Population Prospects 2022, which was released Tuesday on World Population Day, India is expected to overtake China as the world’s most populous country in 2023.
“This year’s World Population Day falls in a special year because we expect the birth of the eight billionth person to live on Earth. UN Secretary-General António Guterres said, “This is a time to celebrate our differences, recognise our shared humanity, and be amazed by the advances in health that have made people live longer and cut the death rates of mothers and children by a huge amount.” “At the same time, it’s a reminder of our shared responsibility to take care of our planet and a chance to think about where we’re still not living up to our promises to each other,” he said.
The world’s population is growing at its slowest rate since 1950. In 2020, the growth rate fell below 1%. The United Nations thinks that the world’s population could reach about 8.5 billion people in 2030 and 9.7 billion people in 2050. It is expected that there will be around 10.4 billion people in the world in the 2080s, and that number will stay the same until 2100.
World Population Prospects 2022 also says that many countries’ birth rates have dropped a lot in the last few decades. Two-thirds of the world’s population lives in a country or area with a lifetime fertility rate of less than 2.1 births per woman. This is about the level needed for a population with low death rates to stop growing over time. Between 2022 and 2050, the populations of 61 countries or areas are expected to drop by 1% or more due to low birth rates and, in some cases, high rates of people leaving.
More than half of the growth in the world’s population that is expected by 2050 will happen in just eight countries:
Congo (Democratic Republic of)
Egypt
Ethiopia
India
Nigeria
Pakistan
Philippines
Tanzania is a country in Africa.
More than half of the growth expected by 2050 is expected to come from countries in sub-Saharan Africa.
UN Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs Liu Zhenmin said, “The relationship between population growth and sustainable development is complicated and has many facets.” “Rapid population growth makes it harder to get rid of poverty, fight hunger and malnutrition, and expand health care and education systems. On the other hand, achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, especially those related to health, education, and equal rights for women and men, will help lower birth rates and slow the growth of the world’s population.
It is expected that by 2050, 16% of the world’s population will be 65 or older, up from 10% in 2022. At that time, the number of people over 65 will be more than twice as high as the number of children under 5 and about the same as the number of children under 12.
In 2019, the world’s life expectancy at birth was 72.8 years, which is almost 9 years longer than it was in 1990. With further drops in death rates, the world’s average lifespan is expected to reach 77.2 years in 2050. Still, in 2021, the least developed countries had a life expectancy that was 7 years less than the average for the world.
“Because the world’s population is mostly young, more things that governments could do to slow down birth rates wouldn’t make much of a difference between now and the middle of the century. Still, John Wilmoth, Director of the Population Division of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, said that if lower fertility stays the same for several decades, it could slow the growth of the world’s population more significantly in the second half of the century.
