Date: 15/09/2022

Relevance: GS-2: Effect of policies and politics of developed and developing countries on India’s interests; Indian diaspora. Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources.

Key Phrases: Global Population Trends, World Population Prospects (WPP), Impact of declining population, Demographic Dividend, Population projections

Context:

• According to the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences the population of the world’s most populous country, China, is about to start shrinking this year, a decade earlier than forecast.

Background:

• China, which has already abandoned its draconian one-child policy in 2016, has been scrambling to find ways to persuade families to have more babies.
• Even after offering tax breaks, better natal care, and cutting IVF treatment costs, Chinese authorities still have not been able to achieve a growth in birth rates.
• China’s rate of births per woman has slipped to just 1.15 which is lower than the United States’ 1.6 births and even below Japan's 1.3 births.

How is the Global Population crisis expected to unfold?

• The World Population Prospects report outlines that the world's population is still soaring and will cross 8 billion on November 15, 2022.
• The report estimates the population growth will continue at a slower pace and reach 8.5 billion by 2030 and 9.7 billion by 2050.
• The UN report says the world’s population will probably touch 10.4 billion in the 2080s and won’t move much afterwards and culminate at 10.4 billion by 2100.
  • But the population will keep climbing in the poorest Least Developed Countries (LDCs) even beyond that timeline.
• It also says that in 61 countries, populations will fall between present and 2050 and a fall in excess of 20% is expected in many smaller European countries such as Bulgaria, Latvia etc.

Extreme low birth rates across countries are alarming

• The birth-rate situation is dire in countries like South Korea which already had the world’s lowest fertility rate at 0.8, far below the replacement rate of 2.1.
  • The population fell in South Korea partly due to the “Covid Effect” and reduced births.
  • The challenges of costly housing and poor job prospects are dominant over “pro-natalist” policies, offering generous maternity-leave subsidies and better childcare which has not produced desired results
• In October 2021 Japan announced a decrease of about 0.6 million population vis-a-vis previous year and population has decreased in all except one of the 47 prefectures.
• Even China has announced a “three-child policy” but is having difficulty in increasing the birth rates which is essential for labour as a factor of production.
  • China has made attempts to make education less expensive and has even banned profit making Educational apps.
  • But the young couples who have been victims of “One Child policy'' are bearing the burden of older parents and are not keen to produce babies.

There are other reasons for falling population

• There are other reasons rather than government policies for falling birth numbers which are almost the same across the world.
• As people become more educated they want to improve their economic prospects by having fewer children.
• Also, in the modern world one’s career demands make it almost impossible to have a large number of children.

Projecting the numbers for India

• The estimates suggest there will be 1.5 billion Indians by 2042 and from there the numbers will fall.
• A different estimate suggests a peak of 1.7 billion Indians by 2061 and only then moving downward.
• But in both scenarios the fall will be equally dramatic and by 2100 India’s population is likely to be around 1 billion and China’s population is seen at 700 million or lower.
• The numbers are declining faster in south India and it is believed that five southern States where birth rates are very low would only make up 12 percent of the population by 2100.
• A fast-rising number of older folk, matched by fewer working-age people is the pattern observed in Kerala for a few years
  • In 2021 there were 767 babies born daily which stood at 1087 babies in 2012.
  • There is a worker shortage in Kerala that has been filled by migrants who came from other states like Odisha and West Bengal.

The impact of declining Population numbers

• Working-age populations are falling globally while non-working age populations are growing which leads to rise in dependency ratio placing the burden of care on those currently with jobs.
• Decline in military strength
  • Population decline will also lower the military age population, and therefore military power
• Decline in innovation
  • A falling population also lowers the rate of innovation, since change tends to come from younger workers and entrepreneurs
• Difficulties in funding entitlement programs
  • Population decline leads to a less working age population which causes less tax collections to the governments and a dearth of social security programs for elderly.
• Crisis in end of life care for the elderly will emerge because of insufficient caregivers for them.

How are rich countries responding to a labour crisis?

• Countries like Canada, Germany etc. have been long dependent on immigration to drive the economy and support an aging population has increased the number of immigrants.
• Sensing the crunch of labour, China is turning to subsidizing manufacturers to turn out more robots to combat worker shortages
• Many other highly developed countries such as Japan have also resorted to plugging employee gaps with robots.

Conclusion

• There is a decline in population in several advanced economies owing to various reasons and at the same time populations will keep growing the fastest in poorer countries like the Sub-Saharan African countries.
• This contrast in population growth will lead to more global imbalances and more illegal immigrants attempting to reach richer countries.
• Thus, seeing the varying global scenarios we will have to move at high speed, improving education, healthcare and creating jobs, to get demographics to work in India’s favour.

Source: The Hindu BL

Mains Question:

Q. The contrasting state of population growth in rich and poor countries could pave the way to a looming larger socio economic crisis across countries, Discuss. How could India leverage its demographic dividend to achieve its economic and political goals? (250 words).