China’s population has declined. The population decreased last year for the second year in a row, when the birth rate was at a record low and the death rate increased.
There are now more Indians than Chinese, but even there there are not so many children born anymore than would be required to maintain the current population.
For a long time, Europe has been thinking about what to do when the birth rate is only decreasing at the same time as the elderly are living longer and older. The same reflection is facing almost the entire world: everywhere the birth rate has fallen faster and to a lower level than what the UN has predicted.
The birth rate has decreased so much that the research professor Anna Rotkirch Population Association and research professor Mika Gissler The Institute of Health and Welfare at THL would not be surprised if the world’s population started to decrease earlier than the UN has predicted.
Mortality increased, birth rate decreased
China’s population decreased by a good two million people last year, which is not a big change in a country of more than 1.4 billion people. In addition mortality increased sudden abandonment of corona restrictions.
However, this is a trend: there will continue to be more deaths than births, says Rotkirch, head of Väestöliitto’s Population Research Institute. Then the population will decrease if there is not a lot of immigration.
– China doesn’t have that and probably won’t in the near future.
THL’s Gissler states that the decline in China’s population is a reversal of the long-standing one-child policy. In addition, many families wanted their only child to be a boy, which is now reflected in men’s difficulties in finding a partner. Attitudes also affect:
– Even in China, having children is postponed and the young generation may not want children at all, says Gissler.
At the same time, Chinese people are living longer, resulting in an aging population.
Is world population growth slowing down faster than expected?
The world’s population exceeded eight billion last year, and the UN predicts that the growth will continue for several more decades. According to the forecast, there would be a maximum of 10.4 billion people living on Earth in 2086, and after that the population would decline.
In some other forecasts, the turn will occur earlier, and the peak number will not exceed ten billion.
Gissler and Rotkirch would not find it surprising if the turn happened already in the 2060s or 2070s.
– When you look at the latest fertility statistics, it appears that the number of children will decrease faster than expected, says Gissler.
He points out that forecasts are based on assumptions, and they change quickly.
For example, in Finland, forecasts were made for a long time on the assumption that the total fertility rate, i.e. the average number of children a woman will give birth to, would be 1.7. After that, the number was changed to 1.45. It is now estimated that last year’s figure was only around 1.25.
The population is estimated to remain unchanged – without immigration – if a woman has an average of 2.1 children. Now this number is only exceeded in Africa and to a lesser extent in Oceania.
However, no collapse of the world’s population is in sight, as Africa’s birth rates are still very high, an average of 4.12.
Even in Africa, the birth rate has decreased faster than predicted, but growth in the near future is guaranteed by the fact that the population structure is pyramid-shaped, meaning that the proportion of children and young people is large, says Gissler.
Rotkirch states that at the same time as the rest of the world is graying, Africa will be in a favorable demographic phase this century.
– There will be a phase where there will be a lot of working-age people and relatively few very old people and not terribly many children. It has traditionally been considered to be the ideal situation for the economy.
However, Rotkirch reminds that many other things affect the economy.
“Babies are being talked about more and more”
Rotkirch believes that the birth of new babies is entering the political debate more and more strongly. According to UN estimates, we may have already passed the year when the most babies were born in the world.
The UN has been talking about birth control for a long time, but things are changing.
– Few states do that anymore, because the birth rate is not a problem, says Rotkirch.
A policy regarding reproductive rights is made and must be made, but at the same time the concern about involuntary childlessness is increasingly affecting all countries, also in Africa.
– The decrease in the birth rate is a very deep cultural challenge, which traditional means of family policy have been proven to be ineffective. It’s about how to make it possible for people to have the number of children they want. Current study and career paths do not fit this well enough.
According to Rotkirch, a very small part of the population does not want children. In Europe they are about 10 percent and elsewhere the share is smaller.
“Immigration is not a long-term solution”
Although the birth rate in Europe is nowhere near the level that would be sufficient to keep the population the same, the population is increasing thanks to immigration.
This was very visible during the corona pandemic: in 2020 and 2021, the population of Europe shrank. It turned to growth again in 2022, when movement restrictions were lifted.
Gissler states that graying Europe needs more immigration to correct the population structure. Another option is that there is even less money and public services.
Rotkirch points out that you cannot build on immigration in the long term, because all countries are in the same situation.
– If the labor force starts to shrink everywhere, everyone wants immigrants. China is a good example: the population is so huge that the decline in the birth rate cannot be solved by immigration.
– We need to find other sustainable ways to adapt to the aging population and ways to support the desired number of children.
According to Rotkirch, the aging of the population is one of the megatrends of our time, alongside the green transition and technological revolution.
– They affect everything, he states.