POPULATION EXPLOSION CONSEQUENCES: The world's 10 most populous cities are in the third world

From ancient times, the survival of the cities depended on population, tribes emphasized on maintaining high fertility due to higher mortality rate. Many of such polices were carried out by dutiful marriage incorporated into religion and mythology, such as bible injunction, be fruitful and multiply, Hindus Law of Manu. Other ancient prophets such as Zoroastrian also mentioned similar injection to sustain continuation of the nation and tribes.

The arrival of modern technology changed the situation; it not only increased the health standards, but mortality rate has also fallen; the result is increased population with little resources in poor countries. The Western nations are able to stabilize their population, but developing nations are still struggling hard to meet the growing demands of the populations. According to UN (2005) population prediction by the middle of next century, the world population will stabilize at 14 billion people, if fertility rates were increased to 2.1 births per woman. The latest figure suggest that in 2004, 76 million people were added to the world total population, most of which took place in developing (poor) countries. Even though the world population is growing at the rate of 1.2 percent annually, yet it is adding up to the world total population. The world population in 2005 crossed 6.4 billion souls. This massive increase is taking place in six countries. Five of which are developing countries; India, China, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria and USA are increasing fifty percent of the world population.

This increase in population (in developing countries) is affecting the third world countries in many ways. For example, the poor children are twice likely to die before the age of five compared to a child born in the developed country. Similarly with limited land and shortage in water are increasing toll on environment and natural resources. The massive increase in population is causing food shortage, increasing poverty, adding up to the environmental degradation and unemployment added with excessive poverty. For example in Bhopal (India) disaster in 1984, a chemical plant exploded killing 3000 people in one day due to lack of safety measure and little resources available to cop with the situation. On one side, problems like these are natural (or man made disasters) they are often aggravated by the hazardous living conditions in third world countries. For example Mexico City has one of most polluted air in the world due to industrial waste and countless expired vehicles. The worse thing is its population of 25 million, which is affecting majority of the Mexicans. The local and federal government has little resources to tackle urban problems. Majority of the Mexicans want to come to Mexico City for job without realizing that it’s burdening the already scarce resources. Ironically Mexico City and Kula Lumpur (Malaysia) have similar per head captia, but Kula Lumpur is one of the most well developed cities in Asia due to its efficient planning and smaller population. Overpopulation has been disastrous for the planet as whole, but in third world countries it is giving rise to many problems, such as environmental degradation, strain on resources, spilling of sewage and waste and traffic jams.

People who live in poverty lack a vast range of economic resources. The main description of poverty include, lack of shelter, daily necessities, socials needs and insufficient income and wealth. There are many causes of poverty, but one of the main causes of poverty is over- population. According to World Bank (2001) estimate, people living on one dollar a day are extreme poor, while two dollars a day are considered moderate poor. There are about 2.7 billion people in the world who live on less than one dollar a day. In Sub-Saharan Africa countries, the GDP since 1981 has decreased giving rise to increased poverty rising from 41 percent to 46 percent in 2001. A country’s poverty depends on its mix of population density. For example Bangladesh has world highest densities per square km. Majority of Bangladeshi people are engaged in low productivity work, such as farming or agriculture that brings little money to improve their conditions. There are other countries in Africa, whose population is low, but they have infertile land and limited resources to boost their productivity. These resources are limited and are not enough for overpopulated areas. The money earned from such work is hardly enough to buy food or other essential items of life. Ironically in third world countries, poor people have larger families than rich people. Over population is also caused due to illiteracy and lack of education .As result majority of the overpopulated countries are less educated and less skilled. Governments in these countries have little resources to spend on education. The people living in these countries are also poor; as a result majority of the people grow up without adequate education. For example in Sub-Saharan countries only 60 percent of the children go to school; the rest of children try to do some mean work to bring income for their families. Without enough education, it is not possible for these children to have better job or living.

Even, if people in poor countries acquire education, third world countries have little opportunities to offer a decent job. The employment rate fluctuates with economy, poor countries are often living on the edge due to lack of stable economies. One major problem with growing population is the scourge of hunger especially in the sub-Saharan African countries. The population of developing countries is under-nourished and suffering from mal-nutrition, lacking in essential vitamins and proteins from their daily food. Even though over- population has been the main factor for food shortage, but draught, famine and energy crisis are also accelerating the crisis in the third world countries. The main reason for such scarcity is that food production cannot keep up with the pace of demographic growth. In the early 1950s and 1960s, third world countries used to export food, now developed countries have taken that role and third world countries have to buy food from them. The condition is further worsened by the lack of foreign exchange, which third world countries don’t have to import sufficient amount of food. Today developing countries are producing 30 percent of the world food, but they contain 50 percent of the world population, which is a burden beyond their control.

The pattern of urbanization in third world cities is different from developed world. Majority of these cities have become agglomeration of millions of people in squeezed spaces. For example Mexico City has twenty million people with a growth rate of 10 percent per year (between 1980s and 1990s); Tanzania growth rate is above 10 percent. There are examples like Colombo (Sri Lanka), where it is only two percent that depicts that urbanization is not a uniform process. Each city has its reasons for growing, but poverty is uniform in many poor cities. The third world has seen extra- ordinary growth in their population expansion since 1950. The world 10 most populous cities are located in the third world countries. The urbanization has changed the way of life for the people living in these cities. If on one side; these mega- cities have become economic giant for their countries, on the other side they have also created problems; such as disease, congested traffic, pollution and sacristy of resources with a huge gap among haves and have not. These cities are unplanned and urbanization for majority of the third world countries was too sudden experience. As a result of this rapid expansion they find themselves trapped in the middle of polluted rivers, canals and streets, while its people are living in the middle of industrial waste and getting infected with deadly diseases. Thus we can say that there is a direct link between over- population and poverty, health hazards and other social evils in third world countries, which proves that explosive population has consequences to which third world countries must pay heed.