The population time bomb

Top Federal Government officials recently expressed concern over this country’s fast-growing population.  Both Vice President Yemi Osinbajo and Finance Minister Zainab Ahmed spoke at the recently held Nigeria Economic Summit [NES] on the need to manage the country’s population growth. Osinbajo said government is working to reduce the country’s population growth rate by half. The […]

Top Federal Government officials recently expressed concern over this country’s fast-growing population.  Both Vice President Yemi Osinbajo and Finance Minister Zainab Ahmed spoke at the recently held Nigeria Economic Summit [NES] on the need to manage the country’s population growth. Osinbajo said government is working to reduce the country’s population growth rate by half.

The Vice President said poverty and attendant deficits in human development indices become more pronounced because our population continues to grow at three percent annually. Nigeria could become the world’s third most populous nation by 2050 with an estimated 400 million people. Sixty percent of this population will be youngsters.  Osinbajo actually warned of a demographic time-bomb at a consultative forum with religious leaders last month.

On her part, Mrs. Zainab Ahmed said the federal government has been engaging critical stakeholders, including traditional and religious leaders, to advise their followers on child spacing. The swift public reactions to the minister’s remarks at the Summit compelled her to clarify her misconstrued position. Speaking after last week’s Federal Executive Council [FEC] meeting, she said government is not limiting the number of children per mother to four as some news media alleged, but that families are advised to embrace child spacing. She referred to government’s Economic Recovery and Growth Plan [ERGP] which stated that “the management of population growth is vital to the development of any nation.”

A report published by Daily Trust on Thursday last week, October 25, shows that Nigeria’s population has more than tripled from 45.1 million in 1960 to about 200 million this year. The report reveals that while Nigeria’s population is equivalent to 2.57 percent of the total world population of 7.6 billion people, Nigeria’s population density is 215 per km2 on a land area of 910,770 km2.

For cultural and religious reasons, some Nigerians have always reacted vehemently to calls that sought to limit the number of children per mother. The phrase “birth control” has been one of the most controversial subjects of discourse in conservative communities of Nigeria. However, child spacing has over time and to a large extent become an alternative term that appeals better to many Nigerians.

Nonetheless, some analysts do not believe that population constitutes a problem. That it is how government and people manage it that usually constitutes a problem. One economist said “If a country has a huge and productive population, productive in terms of contribution to GDP, high population will be to its advantage.” As things stand however, our productivity is very low; our population growth rate far outstrips our economic growth rate so we are getting poorer by the day, as a nation.

Much of our population is not productive just as government, too, does not have enough resources to cater for the basic needs of its population. This fact manifests in the country’s development indices including Nigeria’s unemployment rate of 12 percent and an economy that is not growing at a rate proportionate to its population growth rate. Experts also assert that even in a situation of positive economic growth, a good GDP is unlikely to match the needs of a population that is growing exponentially. For a country to prosper, it is necessary therefore that its economic growth rate outstrips its population growth rate.

The higher the population of a nation, the larger the size of the land it requires for human activities including farming. Inadequate arable land could mean shortage in food supply. The unending farmer/herder crisis in recent times is attributable to intensified competition for arable land due to population pressure. Un-spaced child birth also exposes a mother and the un-born child to life-threatening risks, while some of the consequences of unbridled population growth include pressure on existing infrastructure and poor quality of life for many citizens.

Population control is a sensitive subject in our conservative clime but the government should initiate a national discussion on the subject since it is a veritable time bomb. We must not wait until it is too late.