In The News

Rise of Muslim Population Poses Challenge for India

Riaz Hassan October 8, 2015
If current demographic trends continue, the ranks of religious believers in the world could rise through 2050, reports a Pew Research Report. Islam would show the fastest rate of growth, and the unaffiliated would decline in proportion to other religious categories. Riaz Hassan, director of the International Centre for Muslim and non-Muslim Understanding at the University of South Australia,...

UN Development Goals Ignore Population Growth

Joseph Chamie September 22, 2015
Population growth is linked to conflict, water shortages and resource depletion, climate change and mass migrations. The global population is now 7.3 billion people, up from 2.5 billion in 1950, and is expected to swell to near 11 billion by the end of the century. World leaders convene this week at the United Nations and prepare to adopt new Sustainable Development Goals for 2030. The draft...

Stuffing Data Gaps With Dollars: What Will It Cost to Close the Data Deficit in Poor Countries?

Laurence Chandy and Christine Zhang September 18, 2015
Data collections, as simple as population counts, contribute to good planning on services that benefit a nation’s development, health and prosperity. Yet such collections are lacking in low-income countries. The International Monetary Fund has set standards on data dissemination and 66 countries don’t meet those standards for population surveys, more than 70 lack living standard surveys and 39...

Border Chaos: Europe Reacts to Syrian Refugee Crisis

Chris Miller September 15, 2015
Thousands of families flee Syria, a nation devastated since 2011 civil war, a dictator’s crackdown with chemical weapons and infiltration by brutal extremists. Millions more people wait in barren refugee camps, lacking work and schools, near Syria’s borders. In just a week, more than 100,000 people fled to Europe, resisted by poor, conservative nations like Hungary and welcomed by others like...

11 Billion People by 2100 Will Greatly Impact Global Health

Brian Krans August 27, 2015
The planet’s population will grow by more 50 percent to 11 billion by 2100. The population division of the United Nations points to the decline in child mortality and increased life expectancy for driving population growth. Of the more than 7 billion people, just a billion use most resources, and humans could do more to live sustainably. If not, “The population growth could have wide-ranging...

Japan Can’t Close Door on Immigrants

Kwan Weng Kin March 25, 2015
Japan’s looming demographic crisis is well known and widespread prejudices against immigrants may cripple the country’s ability to address the problem. Japan’s population could decline by a third over the next 50 years, and observers view immigration as the only viable solution to labor shortages in the Japanese economy. At present, foreigners constitute 1.6 percent of Japan’s population, and...

Fewer Chinese Than Expected Apply to Have Second Child

Patti Waldmeir January 16, 2015
In September 1980, the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party issued a letter outlining the goal of keeping the nation’s population below 1.2 billion by the end of the century and “made an appeal” to promote a policy of each couple having one child. The policy reduced poverty and infant mortality, and the population was reported at 1.25 billion in 1999. But now the elderly represent a...