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Overpopulated – BBC Documentary Part IIIPeople in the past never lived in ecological balance with nature – they died in ecological balance with nature! [20:00] It was utterly tragic … but, with the Industrial Revolution, this changed; better wages, more food , the sanitation, so medical advances. You know, so why did from all these advances, why did population grow?Was it because they got more children? No! 1963 that year when I was at school, actually the number of children per woman had deceased a little in the world – to five. And the reason for the fast population growth – true childhood survivor, four survived at that time, but still one out of five died, that was still terrible.So, it’s only in the recent decades that most of the countries have taken big leaps forward in child survival and in family planning so that we are now approaching the new balance, and it’s a nice balance - two parents, on average, get two children that surviveWe have families in a very happy balance. This is the most normal family situation in the world today.And what does this mean for the future?I will show you the projection, the best prediction into the future, from the finest demographers we have at the population division of the United Nations, and it looks like this…It’s going to continue, first, up to eight and then it goes up to nine and then it … but see it’s slowing down and by the end of the century it’s becoming more flat there And if I do a close up of this, you can see, eh, that we are expecting a slowing down and the end of fast population growthBut of course this is a projection that has a certain degree of uncertaintyBut we are sure that we are at the end of fast population growth within this centuryIt is all due to a remarkable effect of the falling fertility rateLook here…, if we go back into this, I’ll show this by showing you the number of children in the world, the number of children from zero to fifteen years of ageHere they come, look, eh? The number of children increase slowly and then, rapidly, so by the turn of the century here there were 2 billion children in the world.To me, that was an important year because that is when tourists were born. That is my first grand-child, and she was born at the very special time for children in the world, because the specialists, the demographers estimate that only this year, the number of children will continue like thisIt will not increase anymoreBy the end of the century, we will still have 2 billion children in the world When Doris was born was when the world entered into an age of Peak Child - the number of children are not increasingNow, this will confuse you because how can, then, the total population go like this if the children doesn’t increase, where do all these adults come fromI have to leave this fancy digital stuff and show you really powerful educational material we have developed, eh, and it’s hereI will show the world’s population … ladies and gentlemen … form of foam blocksOne block is one building and that means that we have 2 billion children in the worldThen, we have 2 billion between 15 and 30 years of age – these are rounded numbersWe have one billion 30 to 45, [24:00] we have one billion 45 to 60 and then we have my block, 60 years and over, on top, eh? This is the world population today. And, you can see that there are three billion missing back hereOnly a few of them are missing because they have died. Most of them are missing because they were never born. Because, back then, you know, before 1980, there were much fewer children born in the world because there were less women giving birth to childrenSo this is what we have todayNow what will happen in the future?You know what happens to old people like me? They die, yes. There was someone here who works in hospitals, so, yes, they die. The rest, they grow 15 years older and have 2 billion children.These ones are now old, time to die. And these ones grow 15 years older and they have 2 billion children. This one die and the rest grow 15 years older and have 2 billion children, and … without increasing the number of children, we’re also increasing the length of life We have 3 billion people more by this big inevitable fill-up of adults, which will happen just when the large young generations grow up Now, there is one more detail, which is good news for the older ones here, like me, that it’s estimated that the old people will live a little longer, so, so we have to add one billion more for the old people on topAnd I’m desperately hoping that I will be part of that, because then I can live long and read the annual statistics as they come reporting every yearBut when I talk to many fine environmental activists, which are really … have a good concern about the environment, they very often tell me “We have to stop population growth at 8 billion!” but when I then talk with them…They, first, they don’t know we have reached Peak Child and then they are completely unaware that most of the remaining population growth is an inevitable fill-up of adultsSo we will end up with more or less this amount of peopleSo we know how many billions there will be, but what about where they live – now and in the future?There you have the world, and here are the 7 billion. Now, out of the 7 billion, one live in the Americas, north and south togetherOne in Europe, one in Africa and four in Asia. So this is now, but how to remember this? I have a very simple way of remembering this. I put up the numbers like this and then say “this is the PIN code of the world; 1 1 1 4”Now, what will happen up to mid-century? Let me know fairly well…Europe, no increase. In fact, the European population is decreasing. In America, a little more people, mainly retired people in Latin America so it makes no difference, almost the same. In Asia, we will have one billion more and then, the population growth in Asia is over. In Africa, in the next 40 years the population will double, to two billion[27:30] Now, to the end of the century…Well, we know quite well no more people in Europe, no more in America, no more in Asia but Africa it set, as we have data today, for another doubling … so, there will be four billion in Africa.The 2100 and probably the final PIN code will be 1 1 4 5 So, in 2100 there will be quite a different world The people who live in what the call “the old West” will, by then, be less than 10% of the world’s population80% of the world’s population will be living in Asia and AfricaBut will there be resources enough to sustain them? Well, this will be a huge challenge and nothing will come automatically but my take is that it is all possible for all these billions to live well together[28:30] Certainly it is easy to see the potential for a prosperous and peaceful Asia of 5 billion peopleJapan, South Korea and others are already rich. Following them on the road to wealth are larger and larger parts of China, India, Indonesia and many other parts of Asian countries. Even poor Asian countries, more and more, are getting a decent lifeBut what about a future Africa … of much as four billionWill most of them be living in terrible poverty? I have seen extreme poverty in Africa. Thirty years ago, I spent the two most intense years of my life, working as medical doctor in one of the poorest countries, Mozambique, on the East Coast of AfricaMozamibique had just become independent after a long war against the colonial power; Portugal And my job was to be one of two doctors, we were both foreigners, for three hundred thousand people, and this was the hospitalMy wife was also there, working as a mid-wife. This is the entire staff of the hospitalThose with white coats, have the chance, during the colonial period, to get professional training of at least one yearThe others, many of them, couldn’t even read and writeBut they all worked with such dedication and motivation but the patients came with the worst diseases of extreme poverty and our resources were often not enough and especially, my skills as a young doctor did not meet the need of the patientsMozambique today is still a very poor country but things have improved immensely since I was there 30 years ago [30:35] ................
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