Prof. Arun C Mehta
On the occasion of International Population day, the United Nations Department of Economic & Social Affairs (UNDESA) released the World Population Prospects 2022 (WPP) which reveals that India will over cross the population of China in 2023. As per the WPP, India total population of India will touch 1,428 million in 2023 as against the population of China which is expected to be 1,426 million in 2023.
Even though the margin of the population between the two countries will be only 2 million but India will continue to be the most populous country in the World and its population in 2064 is expected to touch 1,697 million people. The entire world’s global population is expected to touch around 8,000 million in 2023; which gives India’s share of the total population of 17.85 percent. However, it is predicted that India's population will gradually come down to 1530 million in the year 2100. Even then, India will have more people than China which is predicted to have 1425 million people in the year 2100.
The Worlds population is predicted to be 9000 million in 2038 and India’s share of 17.85 percent of the world's population, continues then India would have an approximate 1607 million people which would be 179 million more people than in the year 2023. It may be recalled that India’s population in the latest 2011 Census was 12,10,855 thousand in view of which India is expected to have 217 million more people in 2023 than in 2011 which comes to an increase of around 17.93 percent.
It may be recalled that the Report of the Expert Group on Population Projections set up by the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare released in June 2020, projected India's population to be 13,83,163 thousand people in 2023 which is much below the latest projection of India’s population released by the UNDESA through WPP which has large implications for India to move towards Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) in general and Goal 4 on Education in particular. The difference between the two estimates is huge and to the tune of 45 million (4.5 Crores). The difference in the total population is also likely to be reflected in the school-going age population which if happens many of the present indicators, mostly enrolment-based indicators would be required to be relocked into. However, when the 2021 Census figures are available would throw more light on the status of school education in terms of universal enrolment.
The Population predictions by the UNDESA and their implications can be understood more through the following graphs published in the Hindustan Times on 12th July 2022 (Delhi NCER Edition). Readers are advised to give full reference of the material used in any form of use.
1. India will overtake China as the most populous country in 2023
2. The World population is growing but at a slow pace
3. Which countries will drive the rise?
4. Are the drivers of growth similar?
5. How did the pandemic affect the population?
The UNDESA predictions further suggest that the COVID19 pandemic might have affected the global population in three ways but have conclusive evidence only in the case of only one way i.e. fall in global life expectancy at birth to 71 years in 2022 from a high 72.8 in 2019 which is found to be true for across the regions of the World except for the West & Central Africa. East and Southern Asia also experienced the highest decrease which is to the tune of 1.8 percent from 63.1 years in 2019 to 62.5 years in 2022.
Read more....
Posts
