NEW YORK (Realist English). India is projected to surpass China as the world’s most populous country during 2023, according to the UN report “World Population Prospects-2022”. This report predicts that on November 15 of this year, the world’s population will exceed 8 billion people.
As of the moment, the population of China is estimated at 1 billion 426 million people, and India — at 1 billion 412 million. It is expected that the Indian population will continue to grow, reaching 1 billion 668 million people by 2050. In China, the population will decrease and by the middle of the century it will decrease to 1 billion 317 million people.
“India and China were alternately the most populous countries in the world until 1700. But from 1820-2013 China’s population was consistently larger than India’s. In 1882, China’s population was 381 million, India’s was 209 million, and the US’s was 9.98 million. In 2014, India’s population again surpassed China’s,” Senior Researcher at the University of Wisconsin.Yi Fuxian told Hindustan Times.
According to Yi, that switch has already happened.
“China is no longer the most populous country in the world, and India’s population has surpassed that of China. The world geopolitical and geo economic pattern is undergoing historic changes. However, due to economic inertia, it will take decades (>30 years) for India’s economy to surpass China and the United States,” he said.
The UN report notes that the demographic boom is ending, as the population is now growing more slowly since the 1950s. According to forecasts, by 2030 the world’s population will grow to 8.5 billion, in 2050 — to 9.7 billion and by 2100 it will reach 10.4 billion people.
More than a half of the projected population growth by 2050 will be concentrated in just eight countries: the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines and Tanzania.
