The UN Forecasts Population of India to Surpass China by 2028

A United Nations forecast released on Thursday predicted an increase in the world population to 8.1 billion in 2025 and 9.6 billion in 2050 from 7.2 billion today. Most of the population growth is expected in developing countries, particularly in Africa where more than half the increase will happen. The rate of growth stated in the report is faster than previously estimated.

Since the last report in 2011, the UN has revised the population projection to accommodate high projections of fertility in nations with the most number of children per women. The UN clarified that the new and higher projections is influenced by new data on fertility levels in countries with high birth rate.

Population projections for India and China

The World Population Prospects report also predicted that both China and India would have around 1.45 billion people each with India surpassing China by the year 2028. In effect, India would be the most populous country in the globe. The UN forecast states that India’s population growth will continue until 2050. The population of India will grow to around 1.6 billion and by 2100 this will decline to around 1.5 billion. Meanwhile, China’s population will start declining after 2030 and by 2100, the forecast is 1.1 billion.

Developing vs. developed countries

In 2050, the projection for the 49 least developed nations in the world is that they will collectively double in size from 900 million this year to 1.8 billion in 2050. With regard to the developed countries, the population will not change much.

As a whole, the growth of the population has slowed with the exception of the nations with persistently high fertility rates. Countries where fertility levels are still high include Ethiopia, Niger, Nigeria, and Uganda. Nigeria is put on the spot with its population expected to rival that of China by 2100. By the middle of the century, the population of Nigeria (440.3 million people) is going to surpass that of the United States (400.8 million people). The projected population of Nigeria for 2100 is 913.8 million, enough to make it the main contender against China for the second most populous country after India at that time in the future.

Wu Hongbo, the Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations say that these figures are a reminder that some developing countries are still growing rapidly.

The World Population Prospects

Every two years, the United Nations releases a report called the World Population Prospects, which presents data from 233 countries. This recurrent series contains the United Nation’s assessment of population trends. The Director of the Population Division of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the UN, John Wilmoth, however wants to remind everyone who sees the report to exercise caution because there is still a lot of uncertainty when it comes to population trends. His department prepared the report.

According to Wilmoth, population trends are greatly affected by mortality, migration, and most of all fertility. Since the 1960s, fertility has rapidly fallen and the average number of children per woman has since declined, particularly in the following highly populated countries: Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Iran and South Africa.

Photo Credit: A mosaic of the many facets of life in India.