With each country having more than 1.4 billion citizens this year, India is expected to overtake China as the world's most populous nation in 2023, the UN warned on Monday (July 11), saying that high fertility would pose a threat to economic growth.
According to a report released on Globe Population Day, the population of the world, which is projected to reach 8 billion by November 15 of this year, might increase to 8.5 billion in 2030 and 10.4 billion in 2100 as the rate of mortality slows.
In 2011, 1.21 billion people called India home, according to the country's ten-year-old domestic census. The COVID-19 outbreak caused the government to postpone the 2021 census.
As stated in UN predictions, global population growth has slowed to its lowest level since 1950 and will be around 1% by 2020.
The average fertility rate for the entire world's population in 2021 was 2.3 births per woman over her lifetime, down from over 5 in 1950. By 2050, it is predicted that global fertility would have further decreased to 2.1 births per woman.
International migration is increasingly influencing population change in high-income countries. Migration will be the only factor influencing population increase for this set of nations over the ensuing several decades. The excess of births over deaths is what causes population growth in low-income and low-middle-income nations.
"This is an occasion to celebrate our diversity, recognize our common humanity, and marvel at advancements in health that have extended lifespans and dramatically reduced maternal and child mortality rates," UN Secretary-General António Guterres said in a statement.
However, an expanding population served as a reminder of the shared duty to protect the environment and to "reflect on where we still fall short of our commitments to one another", he said.
Referring to an earlier World Health Organization report that estimated approximately 14.9 million deaths from the COVID-19 pandemic between January 2020 and December 2021, the UN report stated that global life expectancy at birth fell to 71 years in 2021 from 72.8 years in 2019, owing primarily to the pandemic.
According to the United Nations, eight countries will account for more than half of the projected increase in global population between now and 2050: Congo, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines, and the United Republic of Tanzania.
More than half of the increase forecast through 2050 is anticipated to come from sub-Saharan African nations.
However, a decline in fertility is expected to result in a 1% or more decrease in the population of 61 nations between 2022 and 2050.
