The African Population Explosion we are too scared to talk about

Save us!

 

I really am trying to take this at face value, but part of me feels like I'm being suckered.

 

Some perspective

 

Here is who will be building the infrastructure for those 4 billion people:

 

Ive

see. Maps like this before. It tripped me out a bit.

 

The mercator projection skews everything so much it's hard to visualize without a globe or something like that website.

 

Or a tripel Winkel projection or Robinson etc.

 

To be fair, I think only around half of Africa is habitable, due to its deserts.

 

what if population estimates are wrong?

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...pulation-crisis-wrong-fertility-rates-decline

 

It helps to not be on drugs when looking at a map.

 

Actually, it's a natural result of the economic environment -- and the way all of humanity used to live until somewhere in the 20th century.

In a poor/under-developed economy, a woman's kids become her security in old age. As opposed to social security etc. in more developed nations.

 

Yep, this...for better or worse.

 

I would wonder about this. In poor countries, children are seen as a source of security in a woman's elder years.

This was true for all of our/human history, until about a century ago.

Even here in the US, as recently as the 19th century, families regularly had 6-10 children. They weren't seen as economic liabilities then.

 

Isn't this really a problem of governance....not resources? I tend to think so.

 

Truthfully, antibiotics and green revolution are the problem.

500 years ago, starvation and Yesteria pestis would have taken care of the problem.



I'm glad people dont die horrible needless deaths anymore, but it has introduced imbalance.

 

This is actually (and horrifically) spot on. In the past, large-scale wars would cull excess population. We haven't had one of those in a while.

 

They were seen as farm workers. That crop is not going to harvest itself.

 

Yes, that's true. Really, up until about the 1960s, children were seen as economic benefits to their parents.

Of course, the economy has changed a lot since then, and children are now seen (whether we admit or not) as economic liabilities, in nations with modern economies. That's one (but not the only) reason for the plunging fertility rate in nations that have modern economies.

Back to the 19th century (and before) -- there was no such thing as "having too many children." The more you could have, the better.

I guess my main point is that a lot of these African nations are, in many ways, still in the 19th century. So the idea that African women want to have fewer children may be somewhat true, but I think it's being overinflated by the OP of this thread.

 

I would think the explosion of the earths population would be one of the biggest drivers of climate change moving forward. I hear lots about energy industry vis-a-vis climate change but not so much about the earths escalating population and climate change.