China recorded its first population drop in six decades in 2022, and in 2023, it is reported to have lost the title of “world's most populous country” to India. By 2050, China's population is expected to fall to around 1.32 billion, while India's will have hit 1.67 billion, according to the United Nations.
China's population decline can be traced back to the restrictive family-planning policies launched in the 1970s and an impressive economic boom fueled by China's huge labor force. China's modernization brought rapid urbanization, rising income levels, and better education to large parts of the country.
India to overtake China as world's most populous country in April 2023, United Nations projects. 24 April 2023 - China will soon cede its long-held status as the world's most populous country.
Japan's population of more than 125 million has been declining for 16 years and is projected to fall to 87 million by 2070.
According to data published Tuesday by the National Bureau of Statistics of China, the population of mainland China was 1.411 billion people at the end of 2022, a decrease of 850,000 over the previous year.
If China were on track to grow at 4–5% a year to 2050, as many seem to hold, it follows that China would be on course to become the world's most dominant economy by far. With 2–3% growth, China's future looks very different. China would still likely become the world's largest economy.
Earlier this year, many firms had raised their expectations for 2023 growth. In June, the World Bank raised its forecast for China's growth this year to 5.6%, up from 4.3% previously. The International Monetary Fund in April raised its forecast for China's GDP to 5.2%, up from 4.4% previously.
The once-vibrant nation is on the way to becoming a country with lots of elderly people and fewer workers. The Korean Statistical Office reported recently that the country lost population in the past three years: It was down by 32,611 people in 2020, 57,118 in 2021 and 123,800 in 2022.
China is forecast to lose almost half of its people by 2100, plunging from more than 1.4 billion to 771 million inhabitants. Russia, Germany, South Korea and Spain are all set to join this downward movement, with their populations beginning to decline by 2030.
There are several countries around the world that are at or near ZPG, including Iceland, Germany, Portugal, and Poland. The population stabilization that accompanies ZPG is often seen as a critical component to long-term sustainability for a country, region, or the world.
Some consensus has concluded that China has reached the qualifications of superpower status, citing China's growing political clout and leadership in the economic sectors has given the country renewed standings in the International Community.
Despite the rollback of China's one-child policy, and even after more recent incentives urging families to have more children, China's population is steadily shrinking — a momentous shift that will soon leave India as the world's most-populous nation and have broad rippling effects both domestically and globally.
Russia may be different. Its population is falling unusually fast and may drop to 130m by mid-century. The decline is associated with increased misery: the life expectancy at birth of Russian males plummeted from 68.8 in 2019 to 64.2 in 2021, partly because of covid, partly from alcohol-related disease.
Instead, halfway through 2023, it's facing a confluence of problems: Sluggish consumer spending, a crisis-ridden property market, flagging exports, record youth unemployment and towering local government debt.
A new study released by the European Commission demographic agency Eurostat predicts that Germany's population will go down by 14 percent in the year 2060, making it only the third-biggest country in Europe.
825 is the population of Vatican City.
The EU's population on 1 January 2022, was 446.7 million - a slight decrease compared to the same day in 2021. Although the population overall has grown by 4% compared to 2001, the population fell for the second consecutive year.
Indeed, according to current projections, China's population is likely to drop below 1 billion by 2080 and below 800 million by 2100.
She said low fertility rate, the major reason behind population decline, is a by-product of economic and social development. "Nearly all developed economies in the world have low fertility rate. The better a social security system develops, the less people rely on the family for elderly care," said Li.
Busy urban lifestyles and long working hours leave little time for some Japanese to start families, and the rising costs of living that mean having a baby is simply too expensive for many young people.
Birth rate highs and lows
On the other side of the scale, the CIA estimates Monaco has the lowest birth rate in the world at 6.63 average annual births per 1,000 people per year.
Rajah last year projected that while China would become the world's biggest economy by 2030, “its size advantage over America would be slim and it would remain far less prosperous and productive per person than the United States and other rich countries, even by mid-century.” The Japan Center for Economic Research, ...
The end of Covid restrictions is helping to drive an economic recovery in the Chinese Mainland as life gets back to normal for consumers and businesses alike. KPMG China's economists have forecast 5.7% GDP growth for 2023.
India is likely to have overtaken China as the world's biggest nation in 2022. The UN expects it to have 1.7 billion people to China's 1.4 billion in 2050. Forecasting when and if the global population will shrink is extraordinarily difficult, but what has happened in China is likely to have brought that day closer.