The pecking order of the world’s population is soon to change

The world’s population is expected to reach 8bn on November 15th. But, such is the uncertainty with counting every person on the planet, that milestone may already have been reached. India is forecast to surpass China as the world’s most populous country in 2023 or soon thereafter.

The un hedges its predictions even as it makes them. A new forecast published on July 11th says that the world’s population will reach 9.7bn in 2050, 800m more than it thought in 2002. By 2100 the world will contain between 8.9bn and 12.4bn people, with a 50/50 chance that its population will be shrinking.

Just a handful of countries are expected to lie behind population growth. The un forecasts that 43% of the increase between now and 2050 will come from five: the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria and Pakistan. America will remain the third-largest country in 2050, with 375m inhabitants, after it has added another 40m people. Nigeria will add four times that number and be nearly as big as America. It will displace Indonesia as the fourth-most-populous place.

Some countries are helping the Earth’s population to level out. This year 41 countries and territories are expected to lose more people than they gain from births and immigration. Ukraine’s population, ravaged by war, will shrink by around 7m. The population of Europe, the world’s oldest region, with a median age of 42 years, began shrinking in 2020 after peaking at 747m. By 2050 it is forecast to have 40m fewer inhabitants than it does today.

It is a safer bet that the distribution of humanity across the world will shift dramatically. Europe started on the path to population decline in the 1970s after the number of births per woman fell below 2.1—the level needed to replace people who die. It has since fallen to 1.5. Fertility in Africa, the world’s youngest region, is nearly three times Europe’s, and it will not fall below replacement rate until 2090. Births in Africa will increase even as the number of births per woman falls. By 2050, 25% of the world’s population will be African.

These demographic shifts will have geopolitical consequences. Since 1950 China and India have been responsible for 35% of the world’s population growth. But China’s population is projected to begin falling as soon as this year. Although the Communist Party now allows women to have three children apiece, they average only 1.2. By 2050 the country will be 8% smaller. Meanwhile, India’s population will continue growing, albeit at a gradually slower rate, peaking at 1.7bn in 2064, nearly 50% higher than in China. That will add weight to its claim to play a much greater role in world affairs. ■

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Source: UN World Population Prospects, 2022