Geography SpecB - Unit 2 (population dynamic)

Death rate is the number people that die per 1000 of the population

·         Natural increase is the population difference between the birth rate and the death rate

Measuring the population

Life expectancy - the average age of which the population will live until

Infant mortality - the number of children aged one or under die.

Fertility rate - the number of children an average woman is to have in their lifetime. (If they have 2 or more children they will replace the parents)

Fertility rates are high in African countries especially around the Sahara, where infant mortality rate is high and parents will need to have more children to make sure enough survive in which they can look after the parent when they get older, also less women are educated there than in Europe and less will be able to find a job meaning so more women are able to start a family at a younger age and have more children.

Fertility rates are low in Eastern European countries as economic uncertainty has led to people being worried on whether they are able to run a family with poor national economy. This has caused the death rates to rise and the population has started to become more of an ageing population

Comparing Countries

Population growth in countries can vary because of:

·          Difference in the birth rate

·          Difference of the death rate

·          Difference in the number of people migrating into the country 

These differences can be categorised into the following reasons

Economic:

 Birth rates can vary because of the cost and benefit of having children. Developed countries have more resources, this ensure better and a healthier population, diet and sanitation etc.

  Social:

• Status of women and their education.
• Religious beliefs and cultural attitudes have been factors for spreading infectious diseases like AIDS/HIV.
• Impact from alcohol, drugs, tobacco and crime led to increased death rates in eastern European countries

Political:

·          Laws placed on family growth 

·         Spend money on hospital, health care and education etc.

·         Also to control the amount of people migrating into the country

Most of Europe has grown very little since 1950- 2009 as it was already an industrialised continent before then and therefore the population had grew then meaning that in 1950 the population had not needed to grow anymore

All of Asia and the pacific, North America and Canada had grew from 100%-500% as they had developed more recently than Europe including Most of South America which had a much lower population increase

In Africa and Middle East most of the countries had a population growth from 1950-2009 of 100%-500% accept a few countries like Libya, Morocco, Ivory Coast and Saudi Arabia which had a population growth of 500%-900%

The reason countries tend to have higher population is because poorer countries tend to have higher infant mortality rate like Ghana and some countries encourage having more children causing the population to increase like Saudi Arabia. Also other variation…