25 October 2011

Why population hysteria is more damaging than it seems
The Guardian - UK

Today, according to the UN's population division, 42% of the world's population lives in countries with fertility at below replacement level. Another 40% are in intermediate fertility countries, where people are replacing themselves. And the remaining 18% are living in countries with high fertility, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa, where women may be having five or more children on average.…(24 October 2011)
Zambia's growing population
BBC News - UK

The rising workload of UTH's maternity unit is a tangible sign of Zambia's growing population. It is 13 million now and projected to triple by 2050 according to the UN Population Division. Even its most cautious projection has the population at 100 million by 2100, with its medium (or best estimate) being 140 million. …(24 October 2011)
U.N. analysts deploy many tools to project world’s population
Washington Post - USA
Conjuring up uncounted people by cross-referencing census data with surveys and other statistics is a common trick of the demographics trade, one of several methods used recently by researchers at the U.N. Population Division to arrive at their landmark population projection: 7 billion people inhabiting Earth on Oct. 31. (...) The United Nations is regarded in most quarters as the gold standard of population projection, but not everyone agrees with its estimates. ,…(24 October 2011)

24 October 2011

Talking Their Way Out of a Population Crisis
New York Times - USA
The world’s seven billionth person is about to be born, according to the United Nations Population Division. Before this century ends, there could well be 10 billion of us, a billion more than previously expected. Nearly all of these extra billion people will be born in Africa, where women in some countries bear seven children each on average, and only 1 in 10 uses contraception. With mortality rates from disease falling, the population of some countries could increase eightfold in the next century.,…(22 October 2011)
30% of GCC youth face unemployment
Dubai Chronicle - UAE

The UN Population Division’s 2010 report on “World Population Prospects” reports that GCC youth accounts for a substantial 30 percent of the working-age population, but unemployment is the highest among global regions. On average, only a third of the GCC youth are in the labor force, compared to half of youth globally. Part of the problem is the proliferation of foreigners.,…(23 October 20118)

20 October 2011

Seven billion and counting
Nature - UK
"It's a relatively simple accounting framework: only birth, death and migration can change a population," says Thomas Buettner, assistant director of the Population Division of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs in New York City, where the calculation was carried out on a standard desktop PC. "But there are a lot of conflicting data as well."…(19 October 2011)

17 October 2011

Too Many People?
The New Yorker - US
The United Nations has been analyzing and forecasting the world’s demographics for decades. 1966, Henry S. F. Cooper visited the Secretariat’s Population Division to speak with two officers, Milos Macura and Inderjit Singh. At that point, the U.N. estimated the global population at three billion three hundred and thirty million. Cooper asked them to look ahead, and Macura correctly forecast that the largest population growths would happen in China and India, and said, “The solution isn’t merely to cut the birthrate but to increase economic growth as well." ,…(17 October 2011)

14 October 2011

U.S. teen birth rate down slightly
UPI - US
The U.S. birth rate for females ages 15-19 was 39.1 births per 1,000 females in 2009 -- a historic low -- but the rate was higher than in a number of other developed countries. The United Nations Population Division said the teen birth rate in Canada was 14 births per 1,000 female teens; in Germany, it was 10 births per 1,000 female teens; and in Italy, 7 per 1,000 female teens, the report said. ,…(13 October 2011)
When will the 7 billionth human be born?
New Scientist - UK
Wolfgang Lutz of the Vienna Institute of Demography says the UN is "under political pressure to disregard uncertainty and name a date" for 7 billion. But he and colleague Sergei Scherbov estimate that the world probably won't reach 7 billion until early in 2013, though it could be as late as 2020. The director of the UN population division Hania Zlotnik defends her data but agrees that "an interval of a few months or even a year would be a reasonable range of uncertainty".…(14 October 2011)

12 October 2011

In Russia, a Demographic Crisis and Worries for Nation's Future
The Atlantic - USA
To a non-expert like me, the Russian demographic story is fascinating, not just because of its national and geopolitical implications but because it is about both low birth rates and high death rates. Male life expectancy in Russia today is approximately 60 years, or at least 15 years less than in most industrialized nations. It has been oft-remarked that many developed nations now have declining birth rates because of job opportunities for women. But Russia's low birth rates are due to economic problems, and together with high death rates caused by poor health, these factors make Russian's demographic problems striking. Together these have led to a decline in Russian population from 148.6 million in 1993 after the breakup of the Soviet Union, to 146 million at the beginning of the 21st century, to somewhere bewteen 139 and 143 million today. The UN Population Division estimated several years ago that Russian population in the year 2025 -- one year after President Putin would complete two six-year terms -- would continue to decline dramatically, settling in a range from 121 million to 136 million.,…(11 October 2011)

07 October 2011

Earth's population to amount to 7 billion in November
Pravda - Russian Federation
As predicted by the Population Division of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs, by 2100, the number of inhabitants of Earth could exceed $10 billion. Some experts predicted that this number can be reached by mid-century. However, many experts talk about the inevitable slowing of population growth and the beginning of a reverse process.…(7 October 2011)

06 October 2011

Ag. commissioner seeks re-election
Daily Comet - USA
If re-elected, Strain said he would begin to view his department’s role on more of a global scale. He noted an “alarming statistic” released by the United Nations Population Division. It projects that the global population could reach 9.3 billion by mid-century and 10.1 billion by 2100. “We must feed, clothe, house and provide energy worldwide to meet this growing demand, and this will result in a tremendous economic impact to all of America,” Strain said... (5 October 2011)