In Kenya, the average woman has six children (down from eight), one of whom is likely to die before the age of one year. As a result of an extremely high fertility rate, the population in Kenya has exploded, doubling in less than 24 years to its present level of 26.4 million. Half of the population is under age 16. As its population has climbed, its food production has decreased almost 30 percent since 1972. The result has been rampant poverty, unemployment (nearly 20 percent), environmental degradation including deforestation and soil erosion, and increasingly overcrowded cities where people migrate to find a livelihood which is becoming ever more unlikely. A key indicator of the quality of living conditions is infant mortality rates. In Tropical Africa, the average is about 120 deaths per 1,000 live births. Compare that with ten in the United States or six in Sweden. Kenya is typical of much of sub-Saharan Africa, a population bomb ready to detonate.
The situation in Rwanda is similar, with the highest population density and growth rate (3 percent) in Africa. A collapse of its coffee market and a 30 percent drop in per capita food production helped trigger one of the worst genocides and refugee crises in recent history.
In China, 1.2 billion people, more than 20 percent of the world's population, live on only 7 percent of its arable land. Draconian measures have controlled population growth to its current level of less then 1 percent. Unauthorized births can result in beatings, forced sterilizations, excessive fines, imprisonment and even demolition of homes.
Are these examples warnings of what's in store if populations around the world continue to grow at current rates?
