 For
decades, the United Nations and the US Census Bureau have been accusing
those who have called for strong measures to curb global population
growth scare-mongers and neo-Malthusians. Restricting population growth
is politically very unpopular. It flies in the face of the world's
dominant and most irresponsible religions. It conjures up fears of
eugenics and Big Brother restrictions on individual freedoms. China's
"one-child" policy is notorious for the corruptness and arbitrariness
of its application. And most couples, come hell or high water, want
between two and five children, with the average around 2.5.
So
it's not surprising that population forecasters are pressured to repeat
the popular and reassuring mantra that global population growth is
slowing down, that soon population will start to decrease, and that in
many nations the problem will be too few babies, not too many.
You
can, of course, develop statistics to support just about any prediction
you want to make, including that one. The problem is that the basis for
this prediction is the one that has got us into so many problems before
-- that what has occurred in the past will continue to happen in the
future, only more so.
Unfortunately, it never happens that way.
That's why the predictors always give themselves wiggle room by
predicting a 'low estimate' and a 'high estimate' along with the 'best
estimate'. Here's what the UN and USCB say these will be for this
century (population in 2000 was 6.1 billion, today we're at 6.7
billion, up 0.9 billion in the past decade):
2050: Low 8.0 billion, Median 9.5 billion, High 11.0 billion
2100: Low 7.0 billion, Median 10.0 billion, High 14.0 billion
These
median forecasts assume that struggling nations' fertility rates will
continue to rapidly converge on the affluent country fertility rates of
1.85 children per couple (i.e. below replacement level). There is no
basis given for this forecast -- it is simply a projection of current
trends. The projection ignores several facts:
- That in
affluent nations, the presumption that population will go into
permanent decline is proving false. The charts at right attest to this.
Not only is absolute number of births increasing, the fertility rate
(children per couple) is increasing at the same rate (i.e. this
increase isn't due to the 'baby boom echo'). The UK has acknowledged its baby boom is creating a desperate shortage of midwives.
- That
in affluent nations, fertility rates among older women are soaring --
couples who have waited until they are financially secure are making up
for lost time, having more than one child late in life, with a record
number of multiple births due to use of fertility drugs.
- That
exploding populations in many struggling nations in Asia, Africa and
Latin America will have to be accommodated in affluent nations of
Europe and North America, to prevent a humanitarian crisis of
unprecedented proportions, driving birth and fertility rates way up in
affluent countries as immigration soars.
- That whenever couples
are surveyed, across the world, they always report wanting to have more
children than they have been able to (I've reported on this before). So
the presumption that fertility will converge 'magically' on 1.85
children per couple, and stay there, when the average couple wants
0.5-1.0 children more than
that, makes no sense whatsoever. Even if all the struggling nations'
fertility rates were to plunge to a more reasonable 2.35 children per
couple, population would be at the High estimates above (i.e. 11
billion by mid-century and 14 billion by end-of-century, and still
climbing).
Given the accelerating footprint of the average
human on the planet, in every nation, none of us can imagine what a
world with 14 billion humans would -- will
-- be like. It will be desolated beyond our comprehension, its oceans
turned to giant sewage lagoons and devoid of life, its forests razed to
the ground and largely turned to desert, all non-human creatures
extinct except for zoo specimens, and energy, breathable air and clean
water desperately scarce.
It's another 'inconvenient truth' for
us to consider. Not that we have much of an appetite for considering
such truths. Easier to bury our head in the (expanding areas of) sand
and hope for magical solutions.
Sources:
Governments of Canada, US and UK -- vital statistics departments. UN
and US Census Bureau population forecasts, 2006 revisions.
|
MADE IN CANADA
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