NEWS HIGHLIGHTS
Theme : Population & Associated Issues
Paper : GS - 1
Recently, when the world population touched eight billion, several headlines focused on how India was the largest contributor to the last billion and is set to surpass China as the world’s most populous nation by 2023.
TABLE OF CONTENT
- Context
- India’s Population Trends
- Depopulation
- Fertility In India
- Replacement Level Fertility
- Depopulating Challenges
Context : Recently, when the world population touched eight billion, several headlines focused on how India was the largest contributor to the last billion and is set to surpass China as the world’s most populous nation by 2023.
India’s Population Trends :
- The total population of India currently stands at 1.37 billion which is 17.5% of the world population.
- Between 1992 and 2015, India’s Total fertility rate (TFR) had fallen by 35% from 3.4 to 2.2.
- Young people (15-29 age years) form 27.2% of the population in 2021. This made India enter the Demographic dividend stage.
- The percentage of the elderly population has been increasing from 6.8% in 1991 to 9.2% in 2016.
Depopulation :
- The depopulation decline (also sometimes called population decline, underpopulation, or population collapse) in humans is a reduction in a human population size.
- Over the long term, stretching from prehistory to the present, Earth’s total human population has continued to grow; however, current projections suggest that this long-term trend of steady population growth may be coming to an end.
Fertility In India :
- Falling fertility rate: It is now well-established that fertility in India is falling along expected lines as a direct result of rising incomes and greater female access to health and education. India’s total fertility rate is now below the replacement rate of fertility.
- Many states are on the verge of population decline: Parts of India have not only achieved replacement fertility, but have been below the replacement rate for so long that they are at the cusp of real declines in population. Kerala, which achieved replacement fertility in 1998, and Tamil Nadu, which achieved this in 2000, are examples.
- Decline in working age population: In the next four years, both Tamil Nadu and Kerala will see the first absolute declines in their working-age populations in their histories. With falling mortality (barring the pandemic), the total population of these States will continue to grow for the next few decades, which means that fewer working-age people must support more elderly people than ever before.
Replacement Level Fertility :
- Replacement level fertility is the level of fertility at which a population exactly replaces itself from one generation to the next.
- In simpler terms, it denotes the fertility number required to maintain the same population number of a country over a given period of time.
- In developed countries, replacement level fertility can be taken as requiring an average of 2.1 children per woman.
- In countries with high infant and child mortality rates, however, the average number of births may need to be much higher.
- RLF will lead to zero population growth only if mortality rates remain constant and migration has no effect.
Depopulating Challenges :
- Invisible trend because of infusion of migrants: Access to working-age persons notably different from the situation in other States with low fertility. For instance, Delhi and Karnataka which are both net recipients of migrants, and will not confront population decline in the near future.
- A skewed sex ratio remains a danger: As the latest round of the NFHS showed, families with at least one son are less likely to want more children than families with just one daughter.
- Difference in education: The stark differences between northern and southern States in terms of basic literacy as well as enrollment in higher education, including in technical fields, will mean that workers from the southern States are not automatically replaceable.
FAQs :
1. What is Depopulation ?
Answer :
-
The depopulation decline (also sometimes called population decline, underpopulation, or population collapse) in humans is a reduction in a human population size.
-
Over the long term, stretching from prehistory to the present, Earth’s total human population has continued to grow; however, current projections suggest that this long-term trend of steady population growth may be coming to an end.
2. What is Replacement Level Fertility ?
Answer :
-
Replacement level fertility is the level of fertility at which a population exactly replaces itself from one generation to the next.
-
In simpler terms, it denotes the fertility number required to maintain the same population number of a country over a given period of time.
-
In developed countries, replacement level fertility can be taken as requiring an average of 2.1 children per woman.