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The earth now has 8 billion people. What is expected to happen?

2022-11-15 17:59:39Kosova&Bota SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX

The earth now has 8 billion people. What is expected to happen?

From the appearance of Homo sapiens, it took approximately 300,000 years before the Earth was populated by a billion people. This figure was reached in 1804, the year when morphine was discovered, when Haiti declared independence from France and when Beethoven first performed his Third Symphony in Vienna.    

Based on demographic data, currently, according to the United Nations, the world has exceeded the figure of 8 billion people. However, this analysis has encountered difficulties and uncertainties, as in some parts of the world, census data are decades old. During Covid-19 it was virtually impossible for some countries to register every death. Even sophisticated computer models may have been out of commission for a year or more. However, the UN declared November 15 as "Eight Billion Day".

Future challenges

People everywhere are living longer, thanks to better health care, cleaner water and improvements in infrastructure, factors that have reduced the spread of disease. Fertilizers and irrigation have increased crop yields and improved nutrition. In many countries more children are being born and far fewer are dying.

Of course, the challenges we face as the world's population continues to grow are many. Pollution and overfishing are degrading the biodiversity of the seas and oceans. Wildlife is disappearing at an alarming rate, as humans are damaging forests and farmland. And while the biggest threat remains climate change, which is calling into question the future of society. Will there be a solution to these crises?

"So far, from general experience, the world has shown that it has been successful in adapting and finding solutions to our problems. We must be optimistic. Simply maintaining the status quo and doing nothing is not an option. Like it or not, changes will happen and the situation will not improve by itself. There is a need for current and future intervention," says Patrick Gerland, an expert at the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs.

Population changes

The world is facing the possibility of massive population explosions and collapse at the same time. Perhaps this year, for the first time in two millennia, China will no longer be the most populous country on Earth, as India is finally overtaking it. Even before China's one-child policy, which took effect in 1980, births in China have been steadily declining anyway. These trends accelerated during the pandemic. There were 45 percent fewer children born in 2020 than in 2015. China's birth rate is now much lower than that of the United States.

The earth now has 8 billion people. What is expected to happen?
Fumie Takino, 89, is the oldest member of a cheerleading group in Tokyo. In 2010, Japan's population peaked at 128 million. It is now 125 million and is projected to decline over the next four decades.

In Africa, on the other hand, trends are moving rapidly in the other direction, where the population is growing rapidly. The median age in Nigeria is 17 years. The birth rate is falling, but still remains 20 times higher than in China. Although food security is already a concern and a third of the country lives in extreme poverty, the country's population could quadruple by the end of the century. But it all depends on the rate of birth of children. All these predictions are assumptions and the reality may be very different.

The earth now has 8 billion people. What is expected to happen?
Emmanuel and Nwakaego Ewenike have lived in a single room with their four children in Nigeria for 11 years. They have no running water and no electricity

Projecting world population is complex

The UN, a group of researchers at the University of Washington in Seattle, and other experts in Vienna are analyzing what could happen over the next quarter century. Based on past events, people expect another deadly global pandemic. On the other hand, despite crises like the war in Ukraine, even demographers cannot yet predict the mass migration that may occur around the planet by the middle of the century. Most experts see that by then the population will have reached 9 billion.

A few years ago, the UN estimated that by the year 2100, the world's population could reach 11 billion. Earlier this year, it revised these estimates, concluding that the figure will be 10.4 billion, due to the decrease in the average number of births.

In addition to global population estimates, climate change and politics are also likely to greatly affect migration between countries. The population in the US and Western Europe is largely dependent on immigration, but it has already become a hot political issue. Other countries with declining populations, such as Japan, have been even more reluctant to welcome immigrants. In this situation, the only way we can get out of this demographic imbalance, according to experts, is well-managed international cooperation.

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