Effects of Population Growth

Nerujan Sivanesan

Issues of human geography have had irreversible impacts on the Earth as we know today. Over the centuries, the growing human population has led to high population densities, and has greatly affected the fate of one particular country. The environmental, economic and social impacts have been both positive and negative in the case of this nation. Although many nations are affected, no other place bears the weight of this issue more than the country of India.

Currently, India has a population of 1,220,800,359 people and it ranks second according to the central intelligence agency website when compared to all the other countries around the world. In addition, population density is the number of people living per unit of an area¹ and India currently retains a population density of 388 people/km² in 2013 according to the population reference bureau website. As a result of their high population, it leads to the emergence of many socio-medical issues and survivalhood complications⁹ such as a lack of water supply as well as having a greater working population despite suffering from shortages of land and resources. In addition, it will lead to the reduction of population growth which in turn will assist in the reduction of its population in the future.

The environmental repercussions that will arise in India due to having a high population will massively affect this nation. Environmental issues such as a lack of water supply and polluted water will occur as a result of India’s continually growing population. In addition, the water supply that is obtained will most likely be polluted because daily garbage generation ranges more than 3-20 tons.³ All this generated garbage is found on streets, infront of homes and other properties which will end up in rivers and lakes, eventually contaminating the water. Also, the unregulated disposal of pollution occurs through drains joining into rivers, streams, and reservoirs.³ This is because companies do not have waste water treatments systems, thus, all the water in this environment will be contaminated by these chemicals.

Moreover, having a human population with a high population density will lead India to have a lot of gas powered vehicles on its streets which will result in air pollution. As a result of air pollution, it will contribute to global warming which will hamper the required weather conditions needed to maintain India’s agriculture, which is a critical part of their economic life. Unfortunately, the poor people will be most likely affected by this since most of them live in rural areas. This is bad news forIndia as a whole because agriculture is one of their most important ways for raising economic income. Even though there are mainly negative effects regarding the environmental implications for this issue, there are still some positive effects too. One positive effect would be that the increase in population in agricultural areas of India will result in a higher production of agriculture. Hence, this will help sustain the country both environmentally and economically because it will prevent shortages in food supply as well as provide an income for the poor agricultural workers.

Economic benefits and complications arise due to India having such a high population. In fact, Indians living in this highly populated country will be more willing to accept lower wages due to having a high unemployment rates. As a result this will attract more companies because they would not have to pay high wages and would allow India to grow economically. Even though India will economically grow because of the attraction of companies, their economy will still suffer due to the fact that a high number of people in this country are in poverty and that the gap between the poor and rich is growing. This is because the rich people are exploiting more resources than poor people.⁹ Also, the number of middle class people found in this nation will continue to grow so the purchasing power will become higher power. Therefore, the more people there are in a country, the greater their economic potential will.

In addition, having such a high population will result in the development of technology. For that reason, rising population promotes the need for some sort of technological change in order to meet the rising demands for certain goods and services, as a result more jobs will become available.¹³Moreover, a mass influx in population is considered harmful to economic growth since the resources found in India are found to be limited due to the increasing rate in population growth. Even though this is true, it can also lead them to have a very high working population. Since, the amount of resources will become limited due to the increase in population; their prices will greatly increase. Nonetheless, the increase in prices of resources would often lead people, especially poor people to suffer from starvation.

Consequences will arise for the reason that India will want to solve/reduce their current issue, overpopulation, however, its citizens financial status will determine whether the methods suggested is agreeable or not. It is a known fact that women play a decisive role in influencing the birth rates during their child bearing years. Therefore, family planning efforts are promoted such as encouraging later marriages as well as increasing the length of birth intervals so that the population rate will be reduced in the future. When successful, family planning efforts tend to help reduce the population rate because families will limit themselves to two children most of the time. In addition, women play a crucial role in high population rates because some women especially the women in poverty are illiterate which would mean there is an encouragement of early marriages. This is because families in poverty usually marry their daughters off in exchange for dowry once they enter their child bearing years. As a result this will assist both the daughter as well as her family economically. Since they are illiterate, they will be encouraged to have children in short birth intervals because they reside in rural areas and once their children become older they will begin to assist in the agricultural work given, as it is their only source of income. Evidence shows that women’s education has a positive association with a wider range of contraceptive product usage in India, whereby women possessing high levels of education use both modern and traditional non-terminal methods of birth control.⁴ In addition, women who are educated tend to marry later in their lives. Furthermore, this would mean that they have shorter child bearing years when compared to women who are illiterate.

India’s growing human population is still a concerning issue and it has affected the fate of this country environmentally, economically, and socially. Through environmental implications, water supplies will sometimes be contaminated because of a lack of waste water treatment systems in industrial companies and an increase in agricultural production will occur due escalation in population growth. In addition, the increase in agricultural production will help India’s economy to become much stronger. However, there are many people in this country that are in poverty which would cause its economy to decline. Later marriages will help reduce population growth because women will now have shorter child bearing years and this method is mostly used by educated women. Uneducated women marry during the initial stages of their child bearing year for economical or social reasons and this would mean they have longer child bearing years. Many consequences will result due to population growth and it can be interpreted in different ways on how it would affect India.

Reference

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