Overpopulation is a major cause of most of the world’s problems. Whether it is a question of food shortage, lack of drinking water or energy shortages, every country in the world is affected by it – or will be. Partly thanks to the import of goods from abroad, any particular country is able to maintain its own welfare. But this cannot go on in an unlimited way. The world population is threatening to rise from the current 7 billion to 11 billion according to the UN. There is a good chance that more and more countries will need their own products themselves. All continents except Africa have a total fertility rate around 2 children per woman, but Africa has an alarming total fertility rate around 4, which will result in an African population around 4.4 billion in 2100 from the current 1.3 billion if nothing is done. The African population boom is unsustainable
and more action is needed to slow down the rapid population growth of Africa. If the problem won't be taken seriously enough by governments and other powerfull organisations, the result will be huge global environmental problems, terrorism, wars and massive global poverty everywhere. It will also harm the richest countries.
Our planet can offer a quality of life comparable to that enjoyed in the European Union to no more than 3 billion people. With a population of 11 billion, welfare per person on a world scale will drop to that of a poor farmer who can scarcely provide sufficient food for himself and knows nothing of welfare. The climate is changing – and it matters little whether this can be blamed on human activity or on changes in the solar system. The sea level only has to rise slightly in order to cause a great deal of valuable agricultural land to disappear.
Human beings have a tendency to want more and more welfare. World-wide the numbers of cars, planes and refrigerators are increasing before our very eyes. But there will come a time when population growth and welfare collide. There is a reasonably good chance that floods of people will trek all over the world searching for more food and welfare.
Technicians are only too happy to point to technology that has solutions to all our problems up its sleeve. Unfortunately technical solutions have not as yet been able to combat world hunger in any significant way. Wherever there is no recognition or solving of the problems on a worldwide scale, war and violence would seem to be inevitable: Everyone wants to survive.
The business world and the religions are generally only interested in population growth. Allowing welfare to shrink is often just as difficult for the rich as fleeing from poverty is for the poor. The only solution for the continuing population growth is more investments in the poorest regions of the world. Some African nations have decent total fertility rates, but in a large amount of African nations, women still have around 6 children on average, which is unsustainable. Some countries also have too low birth rates, like Singapore with a TFR around 1. A very fast population decline will also result in problems, a balanced total fertility rate between 1.5 and 2 is needed in every country for the best of the world.
Education, especially for women, and free contraception helped a lot of poor countries with a rapid increase in living standards. Kenya did a great job for example with taking its population growth problems seriously. In the 1970s, they had a TFR of 8 and it is estimated to be 2.3 in 2020. They became one of the highest developed African countries. In countries with the highest birth rates, women often don't have the freedom to choose their amount of children, with social and religious pressure, lack of contraception and lack of education. The $2.5 billion "Family Planning 2020" project, which was founded by Bill and Melinda Gates, takes the population growth problem seriously and invested in a large amount of money in free contraception for the poorest regions of the world. This way, women will have more freedom in their choice for the amount of children they want, which is a great step forward. The next step for the poorest African countries in economic development can only be taken when their population growth will decline fast. Fortunately, a lot of African governments also started to take the problem seriously, but they often lack funds to have a huge impact. I hope governments and organisations will invest more in Africa to decline its unsustainable rapid population growth.
Please also read these articles about population growth:
http://theconversation.com/niger-ha...te-and-that-may-be-a-recipe-for-unrest-108654
https://sciencing.com/environmental-problems-due-population-growth-8337820.html
https://ourworldindata.org/exports/population-growth-rates_v7_850x600.svg
https://www.who.int/news-room/detail/11-09-2018-global-hunger-continues-to-rise---new-un-report-says
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2019-05/jhub-pif052019.php
https://www.familyplanning2020.org/
The problem is that demographic scientists said that the world has resources for 3 billion people if all want to have living standards like in the European Union or United States. We currently have 7 billion and will be growing to 11 billion if the huge population growth in Africa won't stop. Africa growing from 1.3 billion now to 4.4 billion in 2100 will result in global environmental problems, mass starvation, more mass poverty, wars, famines, unemployment and so on. Yes, Africa is large, but there's a limit of fertile land and resources. Economies can only develop when its birth rates are around 2.
Country - Total fertility rate - Population above 10 million
Niger 5.9 Yes
Mali 5.5 Yes
Somalia 5.5 Yes
Burundi 5.3 Yes
South Sudan 4.9 Yes
Uganda 4.9 Yes
Angola 4.8 Yes
Nigeria 4.7 Yes
Zambia 4.6 Yes
Burkina Faso 4.5 Yes
Guinea 4.5 Yes
Benin 4.4 Yes
Liberia 4.1 No
Malawi 4.1 Yes
Mozambique 4.1 Yes
Afghanistan 3.9 Yes
DR Congo 3.9 Yes
Senegal 3.9 Yes
Sierra Leone 3.9 No
Timor-Leste 3.9 No
Chad 3.8 Yes
Equatorial Guinea 3.8 No
Eritrea 3.8 No
Guinea-Bissau 3.8 No
São Tomé and Príncipe 3.8 No
Madagascar 3.7 Yes
Togo 3.7 No
Mauritania 3.6 No
Central African Republic 3.5 No
Rwanda 3.5 Yes
Sudan 3.5 Yes
Cameroon 3.4 Yes
Zimbabwe 3.4 Yes
Comoros 3.2 No
Congo 3.2 No
Ethiopia 3.2 Yes
The Gambia 3.2 No
Yemen 3.2 Yes
Côte d’Ivoire 3.1 Yes
Jordan 3.1 No
Tanzania 3.0 Yes
Iraq 2.9 Yes
Marshall Islands 2.9 No
Solomon Islands 2.9 No
Tonga 2.9 No
Tuvalu 2.9 No
Vanuatu 2.9 No
Papua New Guinea 2.8 No
Gabon 2.7 No
Ghana 2.7 Yes
Nauru 2.7 No
Philippines 2.7 Yes
Egypt 2.6 Yes
Samoa 2.6 No
Belize 2.5 No
Eswatini 2.5 No
Guatemala 2.5 Yes
Honduras 2.5 No
Kyrgyz Republic 2.5 No
Lao PDR 2.5 No
Lesotho 2.5 No
Oman 2.5 No
Tajikistan 2.5 No
Bolivia 2.4 No
Haiti 2.4 Yes
Israel 2.4 No
Pakistan 2.4 Yes
Cambodia 2.3 Yes
Fiji 2.3 No
Kenya 2.3 Yes
Kiribati 2.3 No
Micronesia 2.3 No
Syria 2.3 Yes
Botswana 2.2 No
Djibouti 2.2 No
Dominican Republic 2.2 Yes
Kuwait 2.2 No
Panama 2.2 No
Venezuela 2.2 Yes
Argentina 2.1 Yes
Bhutan 2.1 No
Cabo Verde 2.1 No
Ecuador 2.1 Yes
India 2.1 Yes
Kazakhstan 2.1 Yes
Mexico 2.1 Yes
Myanmar 2.1 Yes
South Africa 2.1 Yes
St. Vincent and the Grenadines 2.1 No
Turkey 2.1 Yes
Bangladesh 2.0 Yes
Brazil 2.0 Yes
Dominica 2.0 No
France 2.0 Yes
Grenada 2.0 No
Indonesia 2.0 Yes
Libya 2.0 No
Malaysia 2.0 Yes
Mongolia 2.0 No
Morocco 2.0 Yes
Nepal 2.0 Yes
New Zealand 2.0 No
Palau 2.0 No
Peru 2.0 Yes
Saudi Arabia 2.0 Yes
Sri Lanka 2.0 Yes
Turkmenistan 2.0 No
United States 2.0 Yes
Uruguay 2.0 No
Antigua and Barbuda 1.9 No
Colombia 1.9 Yes
DPR Korea 1.9 Yes
Guyana 1.9 No
Iceland 1.9 No
Ireland 1.9 No
Jamaica 1.9 No
Namibia 1.9 No
Paraguay 1.9 No
Suriname 1.9 No
Sweden 1.9 Yes
The Bahamas 1.9 No
Tunisia 1.9 Yes
Azerbaijan 1.8 Yes
Costa Rica 1.8 No
Denmark 1.8 No
El Salvador 1.8 No
Iran 1.8 Yes
Nicaragua 1.8 No
Norway 1.8 No
Qatar 1.8 No
Russia 1.8 Yes
Seychelles 1.8 No
St. Kitts and Nevis 1.8 No
United Kingdom 1.8 Yes
Algeria 1.7 Yes
Australia 1.7 Yes
Bahrain 1.7 No
Belgium 1.7 Yes
Brunei 1.7 No
Chile 1.7 Yes
Cuba 1.7 Yes
Czech Republic 1.7 Yes
Finland 1.7 No
Georgia 1.7 No
Latvia 1.7 No
Lebanon 1.7 No
Maldives 1.7 No
Netherlands 1.7 Yes
St. Lucia 1.7 No
Trinidad and Tobago 1.7 No
United Arab Emirates 1.7 No
Uzbekistan 1.7 No
Vietnam 1.7 Yes
Armenia 1.6 No
Barbados 1.6 No
Bulgaria 1.6 No
Canada 1.6 Yes
Estonia 1.6 No
Germany 1.6 Yes
Liechtenstein 1.6 No
Lithuania 1.6 No
Luxembourg 1.6 No
Montenegro 1.6 No
Romania 1.6 Yes
Slovenia 1.6 No
Albania 1.5 No
Austria 1.5 No
China 1.5 Yes
Moldova 1.5 No
Monaco 1.5 No
North Macedonia 1.5 No
San Marino 1.5 No
Serbia 1.5 No
Spain 1.5 Yes
Switzerland 1.5 No
Thailand 1.5 Yes
Ukraine 1.5 Yes
Andorra 1.4 No
Belarus 1.4 No
Bosnia and Herzegovina 1.4 No
Croatia 1.4 No
Cyprus 1.4 No
Greece 1.4 Yes
Hungary 1.4 No
Italy 1.4 Yes
Japan 1.4 Yes
Malta 1.4 No
Mauritius 1.4 No
Poland 1.4 Yes
Portugal 1.4 Yes
Slovak Republic 1.4 No
Korea 1.2 Yes
Singapore 1.2 No
As you can see, the poorest countries have the highest TFR. The richest countries have the lowest. We should invest more in education and free contraception for the poorest regions. This way, Africa can really develop.
Here's another article called "Africa’s high birth rate is keeping the continent poor":
and more action is needed to slow down the rapid population growth of Africa. If the problem won't be taken seriously enough by governments and other powerfull organisations, the result will be huge global environmental problems, terrorism, wars and massive global poverty everywhere. It will also harm the richest countries.
Our planet can offer a quality of life comparable to that enjoyed in the European Union to no more than 3 billion people. With a population of 11 billion, welfare per person on a world scale will drop to that of a poor farmer who can scarcely provide sufficient food for himself and knows nothing of welfare. The climate is changing – and it matters little whether this can be blamed on human activity or on changes in the solar system. The sea level only has to rise slightly in order to cause a great deal of valuable agricultural land to disappear.
Human beings have a tendency to want more and more welfare. World-wide the numbers of cars, planes and refrigerators are increasing before our very eyes. But there will come a time when population growth and welfare collide. There is a reasonably good chance that floods of people will trek all over the world searching for more food and welfare.
Technicians are only too happy to point to technology that has solutions to all our problems up its sleeve. Unfortunately technical solutions have not as yet been able to combat world hunger in any significant way. Wherever there is no recognition or solving of the problems on a worldwide scale, war and violence would seem to be inevitable: Everyone wants to survive.
The business world and the religions are generally only interested in population growth. Allowing welfare to shrink is often just as difficult for the rich as fleeing from poverty is for the poor. The only solution for the continuing population growth is more investments in the poorest regions of the world. Some African nations have decent total fertility rates, but in a large amount of African nations, women still have around 6 children on average, which is unsustainable. Some countries also have too low birth rates, like Singapore with a TFR around 1. A very fast population decline will also result in problems, a balanced total fertility rate between 1.5 and 2 is needed in every country for the best of the world.
Education, especially for women, and free contraception helped a lot of poor countries with a rapid increase in living standards. Kenya did a great job for example with taking its population growth problems seriously. In the 1970s, they had a TFR of 8 and it is estimated to be 2.3 in 2020. They became one of the highest developed African countries. In countries with the highest birth rates, women often don't have the freedom to choose their amount of children, with social and religious pressure, lack of contraception and lack of education. The $2.5 billion "Family Planning 2020" project, which was founded by Bill and Melinda Gates, takes the population growth problem seriously and invested in a large amount of money in free contraception for the poorest regions of the world. This way, women will have more freedom in their choice for the amount of children they want, which is a great step forward. The next step for the poorest African countries in economic development can only be taken when their population growth will decline fast. Fortunately, a lot of African governments also started to take the problem seriously, but they often lack funds to have a huge impact. I hope governments and organisations will invest more in Africa to decline its unsustainable rapid population growth.
Please also read these articles about population growth:
http://theconversation.com/niger-ha...te-and-that-may-be-a-recipe-for-unrest-108654
https://sciencing.com/environmental-problems-due-population-growth-8337820.html
https://ourworldindata.org/exports/population-growth-rates_v7_850x600.svg
https://www.who.int/news-room/detail/11-09-2018-global-hunger-continues-to-rise---new-un-report-says
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2019-05/jhub-pif052019.php
https://www.familyplanning2020.org/
The problem is that demographic scientists said that the world has resources for 3 billion people if all want to have living standards like in the European Union or United States. We currently have 7 billion and will be growing to 11 billion if the huge population growth in Africa won't stop. Africa growing from 1.3 billion now to 4.4 billion in 2100 will result in global environmental problems, mass starvation, more mass poverty, wars, famines, unemployment and so on. Yes, Africa is large, but there's a limit of fertile land and resources. Economies can only develop when its birth rates are around 2.
Country - Total fertility rate - Population above 10 million
Niger 5.9 Yes
Mali 5.5 Yes
Somalia 5.5 Yes
Burundi 5.3 Yes
South Sudan 4.9 Yes
Uganda 4.9 Yes
Angola 4.8 Yes
Nigeria 4.7 Yes
Zambia 4.6 Yes
Burkina Faso 4.5 Yes
Guinea 4.5 Yes
Benin 4.4 Yes
Liberia 4.1 No
Malawi 4.1 Yes
Mozambique 4.1 Yes
Afghanistan 3.9 Yes
DR Congo 3.9 Yes
Senegal 3.9 Yes
Sierra Leone 3.9 No
Timor-Leste 3.9 No
Chad 3.8 Yes
Equatorial Guinea 3.8 No
Eritrea 3.8 No
Guinea-Bissau 3.8 No
São Tomé and Príncipe 3.8 No
Madagascar 3.7 Yes
Togo 3.7 No
Mauritania 3.6 No
Central African Republic 3.5 No
Rwanda 3.5 Yes
Sudan 3.5 Yes
Cameroon 3.4 Yes
Zimbabwe 3.4 Yes
Comoros 3.2 No
Congo 3.2 No
Ethiopia 3.2 Yes
The Gambia 3.2 No
Yemen 3.2 Yes
Côte d’Ivoire 3.1 Yes
Jordan 3.1 No
Tanzania 3.0 Yes
Iraq 2.9 Yes
Marshall Islands 2.9 No
Solomon Islands 2.9 No
Tonga 2.9 No
Tuvalu 2.9 No
Vanuatu 2.9 No
Papua New Guinea 2.8 No
Gabon 2.7 No
Ghana 2.7 Yes
Nauru 2.7 No
Philippines 2.7 Yes
Egypt 2.6 Yes
Samoa 2.6 No
Belize 2.5 No
Eswatini 2.5 No
Guatemala 2.5 Yes
Honduras 2.5 No
Kyrgyz Republic 2.5 No
Lao PDR 2.5 No
Lesotho 2.5 No
Oman 2.5 No
Tajikistan 2.5 No
Bolivia 2.4 No
Haiti 2.4 Yes
Israel 2.4 No
Pakistan 2.4 Yes
Cambodia 2.3 Yes
Fiji 2.3 No
Kenya 2.3 Yes
Kiribati 2.3 No
Micronesia 2.3 No
Syria 2.3 Yes
Botswana 2.2 No
Djibouti 2.2 No
Dominican Republic 2.2 Yes
Kuwait 2.2 No
Panama 2.2 No
Venezuela 2.2 Yes
Argentina 2.1 Yes
Bhutan 2.1 No
Cabo Verde 2.1 No
Ecuador 2.1 Yes
India 2.1 Yes
Kazakhstan 2.1 Yes
Mexico 2.1 Yes
Myanmar 2.1 Yes
South Africa 2.1 Yes
St. Vincent and the Grenadines 2.1 No
Turkey 2.1 Yes
Bangladesh 2.0 Yes
Brazil 2.0 Yes
Dominica 2.0 No
France 2.0 Yes
Grenada 2.0 No
Indonesia 2.0 Yes
Libya 2.0 No
Malaysia 2.0 Yes
Mongolia 2.0 No
Morocco 2.0 Yes
Nepal 2.0 Yes
New Zealand 2.0 No
Palau 2.0 No
Peru 2.0 Yes
Saudi Arabia 2.0 Yes
Sri Lanka 2.0 Yes
Turkmenistan 2.0 No
United States 2.0 Yes
Uruguay 2.0 No
Antigua and Barbuda 1.9 No
Colombia 1.9 Yes
DPR Korea 1.9 Yes
Guyana 1.9 No
Iceland 1.9 No
Ireland 1.9 No
Jamaica 1.9 No
Namibia 1.9 No
Paraguay 1.9 No
Suriname 1.9 No
Sweden 1.9 Yes
The Bahamas 1.9 No
Tunisia 1.9 Yes
Azerbaijan 1.8 Yes
Costa Rica 1.8 No
Denmark 1.8 No
El Salvador 1.8 No
Iran 1.8 Yes
Nicaragua 1.8 No
Norway 1.8 No
Qatar 1.8 No
Russia 1.8 Yes
Seychelles 1.8 No
St. Kitts and Nevis 1.8 No
United Kingdom 1.8 Yes
Algeria 1.7 Yes
Australia 1.7 Yes
Bahrain 1.7 No
Belgium 1.7 Yes
Brunei 1.7 No
Chile 1.7 Yes
Cuba 1.7 Yes
Czech Republic 1.7 Yes
Finland 1.7 No
Georgia 1.7 No
Latvia 1.7 No
Lebanon 1.7 No
Maldives 1.7 No
Netherlands 1.7 Yes
St. Lucia 1.7 No
Trinidad and Tobago 1.7 No
United Arab Emirates 1.7 No
Uzbekistan 1.7 No
Vietnam 1.7 Yes
Armenia 1.6 No
Barbados 1.6 No
Bulgaria 1.6 No
Canada 1.6 Yes
Estonia 1.6 No
Germany 1.6 Yes
Liechtenstein 1.6 No
Lithuania 1.6 No
Luxembourg 1.6 No
Montenegro 1.6 No
Romania 1.6 Yes
Slovenia 1.6 No
Albania 1.5 No
Austria 1.5 No
China 1.5 Yes
Moldova 1.5 No
Monaco 1.5 No
North Macedonia 1.5 No
San Marino 1.5 No
Serbia 1.5 No
Spain 1.5 Yes
Switzerland 1.5 No
Thailand 1.5 Yes
Ukraine 1.5 Yes
Andorra 1.4 No
Belarus 1.4 No
Bosnia and Herzegovina 1.4 No
Croatia 1.4 No
Cyprus 1.4 No
Greece 1.4 Yes
Hungary 1.4 No
Italy 1.4 Yes
Japan 1.4 Yes
Malta 1.4 No
Mauritius 1.4 No
Poland 1.4 Yes
Portugal 1.4 Yes
Slovak Republic 1.4 No
Korea 1.2 Yes
Singapore 1.2 No
As you can see, the poorest countries have the highest TFR. The richest countries have the lowest. We should invest more in education and free contraception for the poorest regions. This way, Africa can really develop.
Here's another article called "Africa’s high birth rate is keeping the continent poor":
Africa’s high birth rate is keeping the continent poor
Why the birth rate has been slow to fall
www.economist.com