Grew at 16 percent per year from 44 billion to 65

grew at 1.6 percent per year, from 4.4 billion to
6.5 billion. During the same period, LDC
population grew at 2.0 percent per year, from 3.2
billion to 5.3 billion. This chapter explains this
phenomenal growth rate and looks at its
implications.

World Population Throughout History
Throughout most of our existence, population
grew at a rate of only 0.002 percent(or 20 per
million people) per year. This growth was subject
to substantial fluctuations from wars, plagues,
famines, and natural catastrophes. However,
since about 8000 b.c.e., population growth rates
have accelerated. Worldwide population reached
one billion in the early 19
th
century.

The second billion was added about a century
later, in 1930. The third billion came along in
only 30 years, in 1960; the fourth took only 15
years, in 1975; the fifth, 11 years, in 1986; the
sixth billion took 12 years, in1998; and with
population growth deceleration the seventh
billion is expected in 2013. Eighty-one percent
of the world’s population lives in LDCs.

World Population: Rapid but Decelerating
Growth
The world’s population is unevenly distributed
geographically. The most rapidly growing regions
are in the developing world: Asia, Africa, and Latin
America. Their share of the global population
increased from 70.0 percent in 1950 to 81.5
percent in 2000, and is expected to reach 85.1
percent in 2025. From 1950 to 2000, Asia, Africa,
and Latin America grew at a rate of 2.1 percent
yearly, a rate that doubles population in 33 years.
Such growth is unprecedented in world history.

The Demographic Transition
The demographic transition is a period of rapid
population growth between a preindustrial,
stable population characterized by high birth
and death rates and a later, modern, stable
population marked by low fertility and mortality.
The rapid natural increase takes place in the
early transitional stage when fertility is high and
mortality is declining.

STAGE 1: HIGH FERTILITY AND MORTALITY
We were in this stage throughout most of our
history. Although annual population growth was
only 5 per 10,000 between 1 and 1650 c.e.,
growth in 18th- and 19thcentury Western
Europe was about 5 per 1,000, and birth and
death rates were high and fairly similar.

STAGE 2: DECLINING MORTALITY
This stage began in 19th-century Europe as
modernization gradually reduced mortality rates. Food
production increased as agricultural techniques
improved. Improvements in trade, transportation, and
communication meant people. Death from infectious
diseases, such as tuberculosis and smallpox, declined
as nutrition and medical science improved, and after
the introduction and adoption of soap, cheap kitchen
utensils, and cotton clothing led to better personal
hygiene. Drainage and land reclamation reduced the
incidence of malaria and respiratory diseases.

STAGE 3: DECLINING FERTILITY
D
eclining fertility, of the demographic transition
did not begin in Europe for several decades,
and in some instances, a century, after the
beginning of declining mortality in stage 2.