How to feed 280 million in 2051?
Monday, 2 November 2009
H. T. Haider
BANGLADESH is one of the most densely populated countries in the world, with an area of 55,598 square miles (143,999 kilometres) and a population of over 150 million. About 900 people live per square mile in this small landmass. In 1971, the population was 75 million. The population has doubled in last 38 years, but the area has not. Scientists predict Bangladesh will partially go under the sea in the future due to climate change.
According to an article on the website of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare as far back as in 2005: "With a population of 135.2 million and estimated per capita GDP of $421 in FY 2003-04 (Bangladesh Economic Review 2004), Bangladesh, one of the poorest countries in the world, faces severe deficiencies in the quality of its health, population and nutrition services." Bangladesh: A Country Study,' edited by James Heitzman and Robert Wordon, states: "In the 1980s, Bangladesh faced no greater problem than population growth. The population in 1901 was 29 million. By 1951, the population increased to 44 million. According to the 1974 census report the national population stood at 71 million. The 1981 census reported a population of 87 million with a 2.3 per cent annual growth. That is, in 80 years, the population just tripled. By July 1988 the population, by then the eighth largest in the world, stood at 109,963,551, with an average annual growth rate of 2.6 per cent. According to official projections, Bangladesh was expected to reach a population of more than 140 million by the year 2000. The population density increased from 216 persons per square kilometer in 1901, to 312 persons in 1951. In another 50 years, in 2000, it was projected to exceed 1,000 persons per square kilometer.
With the total fertility rate (TFR) hovering around 3.00, there is little possibility of the growth falling, especially with the family planning activities remaining stagnant for years. In some areas the total fertility rate is still 4 or over. The current population growth rate is estimated at a level between 1.4 per cent and 1.5 per cent.
What could then be the possible scenario in the next 36 or 40 years. Will the growth rate by some miracle come down to zero, so that the population still remains at 150 million then? No. And the experts predict that the population of Bangladesh will almost double by 2050 to reach over 280 million. The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MOHFW) predicts a population of 250 million by 2080.
The obvious questions are, where will the extra millions find land to build houses for themselves? If the existing cities and towns double in size by 2050, will there be enough farmland to grow rice and vegetables to feed the 280 million people? Where will they find fresh water to drink and cook food? Will there be enough water-bodies left to breed fish to feed the people? Will there be any forest left at that time? What would be the condition of the environment and ecology?
The existing scenario speaks of a bleak outlook. Maybe, out of fear no attention is being paid to the future. But just by keeping the heads buried in the sand, can the nation expect the problem of growing population to go away.
Journalists are asking then questions, time and again. But it is the responsibility of the politicians, policy-makers and experts to come up with realistic solution. But, it is widely felt that the questions on the growing population make most of them uncomfortable. They often fumble for answers. They try to explain population as "asset" or "human resource." But can millions of malnourished, uneducated, and unskilled people really be manpower? Does the country have the educational and skill development training institutions to turn them into trained or skilled manpower by 2050? Will Bangladesh develop at lightning speed in the next 42 years to be able to provide employment to all its working age population?
Facts and figures only indicate that population growth, unless checked, could nullify all development efforts. Bangladesh needs shifts in policies from domiciliary to clinic-based service to check the population growth. The officials concerned must have the initiative they now lack, to reverse the situation. The field staff need fresh motivation and drive to make population control a success. Social obstacles against family planning need to be neutralised.
Until then, about 2.0 million newborns would continue to be added to the population each year. The question is whether national policies on food, education, health, housing, water, electricity and employment take these factors into consideration in the yearly review? Do the politicians and government policy-makers in Bangladesh feel what could be the situation in 2050 and beyond?
Already, Bangladesh is facing problems of increasing food shortage, shrinking of farmland and water bodies, and depleting of forest resources. Similarly, malnutrition and an ever growing number of unskilled population, increasing unemployment, and the unemployed youth getting into crimes are only adding to its problems. Poverty is forcing the poor to sell their small land holdings to migrate to the cities in search of earnings. Can Bangladesh see these problems, already affecting its development efforts, in isolation?
To check the population growth, the government, non-government organizations (NGOs) and international development partners have to work with greater seriousness for better social and economic results. Anomalies in the country's population control policy, feel observers, are producing contradictory facts and figures. Another result is lack of coordination among organisations, agencies and individual researchers. The Total Fertility Rate (TFR), according to some experts, has remained unchanged until the recent times, after declining rapidly in the 1980s. However, for most of the 1990s at 3.3 children, different surveys gave different results.
Such anomalies need to be removed to get a clear picture of the problem. Further efforts are needed to shift family planning use patterns towards more effective, longer lasting, and lower-cost clinical and permanent methods covering low performing and disadvantaged areas with added emphasis. But to achieve a major change on fertility impact, the age of marriage has to be raised to push up the age at first birth, and trigger a tempo effect, to bring fertility down.
BANGLADESH is one of the most densely populated countries in the world, with an area of 55,598 square miles (143,999 kilometres) and a population of over 150 million. About 900 people live per square mile in this small landmass. In 1971, the population was 75 million. The population has doubled in last 38 years, but the area has not. Scientists predict Bangladesh will partially go under the sea in the future due to climate change.
According to an article on the website of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare as far back as in 2005: "With a population of 135.2 million and estimated per capita GDP of $421 in FY 2003-04 (Bangladesh Economic Review 2004), Bangladesh, one of the poorest countries in the world, faces severe deficiencies in the quality of its health, population and nutrition services." Bangladesh: A Country Study,' edited by James Heitzman and Robert Wordon, states: "In the 1980s, Bangladesh faced no greater problem than population growth. The population in 1901 was 29 million. By 1951, the population increased to 44 million. According to the 1974 census report the national population stood at 71 million. The 1981 census reported a population of 87 million with a 2.3 per cent annual growth. That is, in 80 years, the population just tripled. By July 1988 the population, by then the eighth largest in the world, stood at 109,963,551, with an average annual growth rate of 2.6 per cent. According to official projections, Bangladesh was expected to reach a population of more than 140 million by the year 2000. The population density increased from 216 persons per square kilometer in 1901, to 312 persons in 1951. In another 50 years, in 2000, it was projected to exceed 1,000 persons per square kilometer.
With the total fertility rate (TFR) hovering around 3.00, there is little possibility of the growth falling, especially with the family planning activities remaining stagnant for years. In some areas the total fertility rate is still 4 or over. The current population growth rate is estimated at a level between 1.4 per cent and 1.5 per cent.
What could then be the possible scenario in the next 36 or 40 years. Will the growth rate by some miracle come down to zero, so that the population still remains at 150 million then? No. And the experts predict that the population of Bangladesh will almost double by 2050 to reach over 280 million. The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MOHFW) predicts a population of 250 million by 2080.
The obvious questions are, where will the extra millions find land to build houses for themselves? If the existing cities and towns double in size by 2050, will there be enough farmland to grow rice and vegetables to feed the 280 million people? Where will they find fresh water to drink and cook food? Will there be enough water-bodies left to breed fish to feed the people? Will there be any forest left at that time? What would be the condition of the environment and ecology?
The existing scenario speaks of a bleak outlook. Maybe, out of fear no attention is being paid to the future. But just by keeping the heads buried in the sand, can the nation expect the problem of growing population to go away.
Journalists are asking then questions, time and again. But it is the responsibility of the politicians, policy-makers and experts to come up with realistic solution. But, it is widely felt that the questions on the growing population make most of them uncomfortable. They often fumble for answers. They try to explain population as "asset" or "human resource." But can millions of malnourished, uneducated, and unskilled people really be manpower? Does the country have the educational and skill development training institutions to turn them into trained or skilled manpower by 2050? Will Bangladesh develop at lightning speed in the next 42 years to be able to provide employment to all its working age population?
Facts and figures only indicate that population growth, unless checked, could nullify all development efforts. Bangladesh needs shifts in policies from domiciliary to clinic-based service to check the population growth. The officials concerned must have the initiative they now lack, to reverse the situation. The field staff need fresh motivation and drive to make population control a success. Social obstacles against family planning need to be neutralised.
Until then, about 2.0 million newborns would continue to be added to the population each year. The question is whether national policies on food, education, health, housing, water, electricity and employment take these factors into consideration in the yearly review? Do the politicians and government policy-makers in Bangladesh feel what could be the situation in 2050 and beyond?
Already, Bangladesh is facing problems of increasing food shortage, shrinking of farmland and water bodies, and depleting of forest resources. Similarly, malnutrition and an ever growing number of unskilled population, increasing unemployment, and the unemployed youth getting into crimes are only adding to its problems. Poverty is forcing the poor to sell their small land holdings to migrate to the cities in search of earnings. Can Bangladesh see these problems, already affecting its development efforts, in isolation?
To check the population growth, the government, non-government organizations (NGOs) and international development partners have to work with greater seriousness for better social and economic results. Anomalies in the country's population control policy, feel observers, are producing contradictory facts and figures. Another result is lack of coordination among organisations, agencies and individual researchers. The Total Fertility Rate (TFR), according to some experts, has remained unchanged until the recent times, after declining rapidly in the 1980s. However, for most of the 1990s at 3.3 children, different surveys gave different results.
Such anomalies need to be removed to get a clear picture of the problem. Further efforts are needed to shift family planning use patterns towards more effective, longer lasting, and lower-cost clinical and permanent methods covering low performing and disadvantaged areas with added emphasis. But to achieve a major change on fertility impact, the age of marriage has to be raised to push up the age at first birth, and trigger a tempo effect, to bring fertility down.