One in three people will be 65 or older by the year 2050, according to a report that foresees the world’s population growing to more than nine billion.
The United States government’s annual projections of world population growth show that while the number of children is expected to stay roughly the same, there could be three times as many old people as today.
The report, from the Census Bureau, part of the Department of Commerce, expects the population to grow from 6,2-billion today to about 9,2-billion within 45 years.
However, 88 countries are on course to have smaller populations over that period. The exact growth or decline depends on the take-up of contraceptives and the spread of the Aids pandemic.
According to the bureau, the world population increased by 74-million people — the population of Egypt — in 2002, but that is well below the peak of 87-million added in 1989-90. At 1,2% a year, the increase is also well below the 2,2% annual growth seen 40 years ago.
The slowdown in global population growth is linked primarily to declines in fertility, says the report.
In 1990 the world’s women, on average, were giving birth to 3,3 children in their lifetime. By 2002 it had dropped to 2,6 children — slightly above the level needed to assure replacement of the population.
Census Bureau projections show the level of fertility for the world as a whole descending below replacement level before 2050.
The projections also suggest that Aids, which has killed more than 20-million people in the past 20 years, will lower the average life expectancy at birth in some countries to around 30 years by 2010.
This level, says the report, has not been seen since the beginning of the 20th century. Barring major medical breakthroughs, it expects most of the 45-million people known to have HIV now to die within 10 years.
As a result of Aids, says the report, the population of some southern African countries could fall in the next decade.
Twelve countries have HIV infection rates of above 10% among those aged 15-49, says the report, but others such as Uganda, Thailand and Senegal have managed to stem the tide of the pandemic, giving hope that it can be curtailed elsewhere.
Aids continues to have its greatest impact in developing countries of Asia, Latin America and especially sub-Saharan Africa. Botswana and South Africa are among countries that may see population decline because of Aids deaths.
”Aids alone is devastating the heart of these countries, affecting people in the prime years of not only their eco nomic production, but the prime years of reproduction,” said Steve Mosher, president of the Virginia-based Population Research Institute.
The wild card in the population projections, says the bureau, is how prevalent contraceptive use and family planning becomes in some countries. India’s population is expected to grow by more than 500-million — roughly twice the population of Europe — to 1,6 billion in 2050, surpassing China as the world’s most populous country. However, family planning education in India is difficult because many rural villages cannot easily be reached.
According to the bureau, there are huge numbers of women in the world’s developing countries who would like to limit their pregnancies but are not using contraception.
The report says that contraceptive use is the most important factor in gauging future populations.
”It has risen dramatically since the 1960s [but] there are at least 100-million women in the world who would like to space or to limit their pregnancies,” say the authors, who believe the majority are in Asian and sub-Saharan countries.
At present more than half the world is aged under 30, with just under 2-billion people aged under 14.
The dramatically older population expected by 2050 is expected to contain more than 400-million people – a population larger than the US today – over the age of 80. – Guardian Unlimited Â