World Population To Hit 7 Billion By 2012

WASHINGTON — The world's population will reach 7 billion in 2012, even as the global community struggles to satisfy its appetite for natural resources, according to a new government projection.

There are 6.7 billion people in the world today. The United States ranks third, with 304 million, behind China and India, according to projections released Thursday by the Census Bureau.

The world's population surpassed 6 billion in 1999, meaning it will take only 13 years to add a billion people.

By comparison, the number of people didn't reach 1 billion until 1800, said Carl Haub, a demographer at the Population Reference Bureau. It didn't reach 2 billion until 130 years later.

"You can easily see the effect of rapid population growth in developing countries," Haub said.

Haub said that medical and nutritional advances in developing countries led to a population explosion following World War II. Cultural changes are slowly catching up, with more women in developing countries going to school and joining the work force.

That is slowing the growth rate, though it is still high in many countries.

The global population is growing by about 1.2 percent per year. The Census Bureau projects the growth rate will decline to 0.5 percent by 2050.

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By then, India will have surpassed China as the most populous country.

The Census Bureau updates projections each year on a variety of global demographic trends, including fertility and mortality rates and life expectancy. U.S. life expectancy has surpassed 78 years for the first time, the National Center for Health Statistics announced last week.

The new Census report comes amid record high oil and gasoline prices, fueled in part by growing demand from expanding economies in China and India.

There is no consensus on how many people the Earth can sustain, said William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank. He said it depends on how well people manage the Earth's resources.

Today, industrialized nations use a disproportionate share of oil and other resources, while developing countries are fueling population growth.

There are countries in Africa, Asia and the Middle East where the average woman has more than six children in her lifetime. In Mali and Niger, two African nations, women average more than seven children.

"There's still a long way to go in the developing world," Frey said. "A lot of it does have to do with the education of women and the movement of women into the labor force."

In the U.S., women have an average of about two children, which essentially replaces the population. Much of the U.S. population growth comes from immigration.

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On The Net:

The Census Bureau's International Database:

http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idb/index.html

Comments

[jalapeno]

We are all going to be dead in twenty years, due to massive electrical blackouts and mold infestation from global warming. The yeast will win in the end.

Stockpile Bactrim and Econazole Nitrate Cream.

[mrBlue1]

As a thirty year resident of wet, dark and moldy Washington state, I can tell you, faggedaboutit, none of that crap works.

[Endangered]

Although immigration has increased as a percentage of US growth (from 1/3 to about 1/2 now) it only represents redistribution of population on an overcrowded planet. One key problem is a culture of self-congratulation and narcissism that facilitates blame shifting by parents unable to summon the character necessary to admit the fundamental problem is overpopulation. Solving any issue without accurately articulating the upstream problem is virtually impossible. Denial about overpopulation endangers the lives of every living thing on the planet, an ethical and moral outrage without parallel.

As soon as we realize that energy issues, over-fished oceans, climate change, militaristic resource acquisition, etc. are all subsets of overpopulation, we can start to make progress. The solution isn't a governmental draconian program limiting family size -- it begins with the courage to admit overpopulation is the engine driving our present problems.

Population control will happen to us. The choice we have to make is whether we allow nature to handle it as it has in the past with starvation, disease and warfare, or we admit we have a problem and find less heinous solutions.

"Unlike plagues of the dark ages or contemporary diseases we do not understand, the modern plague of overpopulation is soluble by means we have discovered and with resources we possess. What is lacking is not sufficient knowledge of the solution but universal consciousness of the gravity of the problem and education of the billions who are its victim.
-Martin Luther King, Jr.,

[themodernleader]

Over-population of the earth is the number one problem. Not global warming. Not economic concentration. Not the rise of new empires. Not the global plagues or famine..
In nature, over-population of a species inevetably leads to environmental conditions such as disease or famine that drastically wipes out massive numbers of the species.
In this small intrically operated life system our intelligent species has the power through technology and the press of billions to destroy that senstive balance of nature that makes life possible.
Traditional doctrines fostered by different religious groups are inflicting terrible damage on the chances of the people of the world joining together towards a rational program and practice of birth rate limits. But a plan of population control must be implemented immediately. Otherwise, famine, disease and massive wars will turn our planet into a dark age of human suffering and decline.

[ricchase]

At what point do people realize we must institute serious population control? The days of poor and ignorant women having 4, 5, 6 or more children that will only feed off the system the same way their mothers did should have been over long ago. Then those children go out and have more unneeded children. There should be limits on children irregardless of economic standing or motivation. The world can not feed and care for what we have. If we could, Darfur would not be happening. Are we going to continue at this pace until we start eating our own? Don't snicker or fill with revulsion, it could and would happen.

[raw915]

Peak Oil will institute serious population control.

[mrBlue1]

Actually as the leader of my "tribe," I successfully discouraged two of my three children from reproducing, one to only replacing herself and hubby, and several of my adult son's male friends from having kids by showing them all the movie "Eraser Head" during their impressionable early teen years. Works every time. Unfortunately, its results, in this country at least, are moot as the left over "space" it engendered was simply filled with folk who don't believe in birth control or immigrating legally.

[morbie5]

The problem isn't in this country, we arn't having enought children to replace ourselves.

The problem is in the third world and it can only be solved in the third world.

I don't know why you wouldn't want to have grandchildren.

[protagonia]

This administration has no intention of letting Earth's population get anywhere near THAT large.

[dadw5boys]

Well take a lot of wars to keep the population from growing. 15 billion is total the world can support total even with the most advanced food distrubition systems.

at 6.7 billion it now test the infustructure for the current food distribution system. 7 billion people will requre a more advqanced system or starvation will double.

[hypnotoad72]

Convince people not to have more children.

Indeed, the countries with the largest populations are culturally anti-female, right down to selective abortions no less. Biggest. Irony. Ever.

[vippy]

Why would anyone sane put a child in this corrupt world? Every law is against families and the
future. No jobs, no gas, food crisis, and all so a few can have it all.

[DMcD]

Because, who knows, if you brought your child up right , he/she might be the one that changes all that.

[DMcD]

Population control (not Viagra) , a favorite topic in the 70's , needs to be re-emphasized in todays world.

[rwe]

Either blame it on globalwarming or global wrming will take care of the problem

[wadenelson1]

Malthus would love global warming.