The global population grew by less than 1 per cent a year for the first time since the aftermath of the second world war in 2020 and 2021 with Europe’s total population actually falling during the coronavirus pandemic, according to a UN report.
The populations of 61 countries are forecast to decrease by at least 1 per cent between 2022 and 2050, and the associated low fertility rates will also combine with better healthcare to accelerate the ageing of societies.
As the figures were released in the UN’s World Population Prospects report, António Guterres, UN secretary-general, focused on the benefits of healthcare rather than declining fertility and hailed the “advancements in health that have extended lifespans and dramatically reduced maternal and child mortality rates”.
However, the rising proportion of older people in many countries is predicted to hit economic growth and public finances and is already posing growing political challenges.
Despite the slowing growth, the global population is still poised this year to reach the milestone of 8bn people, while next year India is projected to surpass China as the most populous country. The world population is expected to peak in the 2080s at 10.4bn and will then begin to fall — the first decline to be forecast in the annual UN report.
Europe’s population shrank by 744,000 in 2020 and by 1.4mn last year — the largest fall of any continent since records began in 1950, reflecting a surge in deaths, a fall in births and lower net migration linked to the pandemic.
However, the pandemic “is not the main factor”, said John Wilmoth, director of the population division of the UN’s economic and social affairs department. The fertility rate “has been quite low in almost all European countries for many decades and that means there aren’t lots of young people”, he said.
Europe’s population is expected to continue to contract until 2100, with Germany and other countries joining a trend already established in eastern and southern European countries such as Poland and Italy.
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Two-thirds of global citizens live in a country where the fertility rate is less than 2.1 births per woman, roughly the level required for populations to remain stable if mortality rates are low.
In countries with a falling population “unless you get a productivity miracle, overall economic growth will fall”, said Charles Goodhart, emeritus professor at the London School of Economics and co-author of The Great Demographic Reversal.
In Asia, Japan’s population has been shrinking since 2010, South Korea’s fell in 2020, and China’s is forecast to do the same this year. China’s population is forecast to decline by about 6mn annually in the mid-2040s and by 12mn a year by the late 2050s — the world’s largest-ever drop.
“If you look at a map of the world of countries that are going to decrease in population size, it basically starts in central Europe and goes east all the way to Japan across Russia and China,” said Wilmoth.
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Africa overtook Asia in 2020 to become the main source of population growth. The UN reports that more than half of the projected increase up to 2050 will be concentrated in just eight countries, mostly in Africa, with the rapid growth threatening their development goals. By mid-century Nigeria is projected to be as populous as the US, closing the current 121mn gap between the countries.
More production “could and should” move to Africa, said Goodhart, “because the alternative, of mass emigration into other countries where the population is falling, is politically not going to be viable”.
“It is primarily the ageing and shrinking of the working-age population that affects a country’s economic development,” said Martina Lizarazo López at Bertelsmann Stiftung, a German-based think-tank.
Increased productivity, automation and longer working lives can help reduce the impact of an ageing population, experts said.
Globally more than 1bn people will be aged over 65 in 2030 with 210mn aged over 80, about double the numbers in 2010. Older people already account for about a quarter of the population in many countries including Japan, Italy and Germany.
Joshua Wilde, research scientist at Germany’s Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, said that if fertility rates dropped to a rate at which the population declined, “it’s actually great because you have a higher fraction of the population in working-age groups”. But “in the long run”, he pointed out, “all those workers who are providing a boost to income per capita are going to retire and they will need pensions, they will need healthcare”.
Source: Economy - ft.com
