The world reaches 8 billion: Who are the children born in the 5th, 6th and 7th billion?

The United Nations (UN) claims that the world’s population has reached eight billion people just 11 years after it crossed the seven billion mark.

After the massive increase in the mid-20th century, population growth is already slowing down.

It may take 15 years to reach nine billion people, and the UN does not expect to reach 10 billion by 2080.

The exact number of people in the world is difficult to calculate, and the UN acknowledges that there may be a one or two year margin of error in its calculations.

But November 15 is the organization’s best estimate to break the eight billion mark.

In previous years, the UN had chosen babies to represent the birth of the 5th, 6th and 7th billionth child in the world. Can their stories tell us anything about world population growth?

Just minutes after he was born in July 1987, a camera flashed over Matej Gaspar’s tiny face as a group of suit-clad politicians surrounded his exhausted mother.

Stranded outside in the back of a convoy, British UN officer Alex Marshall felt partially responsible for the instant chaos he created in this small maternity hospital on the outskirts of the Croatian capital, Zagreb.

“We basically looked at the projections and got the idea that the world’s population would exceed five billion by 1987,” he says.

“And the date from the statistics was July 11th.” That’s how they decided to call him the world’s 5 billionth baby.

When he approached UN demographers about the idea, they were furious.

“They told us ignorant people that we didn’t know what we were doing and that we shouldn’t choose one person out of all the people.”

Despite this, they decided to go ahead with the plan.

“It was about putting a face to the numbers,” he explains.

“We found out where the secretary general would be that day, and we left.”

Thirty-five years later, the world’s 5 billionth baby is trying to forget its birth. His Facebook page shows that he lives in Zagreb, is married, and works as a chemical engineer. However, she refuses to give interviews and refused to speak to the BBC.

“I don’t blame him,” says Alex, remembering the media circus on the first day of Matej’s life.

Since then, another three billion people have been added to our global community. But can there be only two billion growth in the next 35 years? and then the global population will likely stabilize.

7 billionth baby

In the suburbs of Dhaka, Bangladesh, Sadia Sultana Oishee helps her mother by peeling potatoes for dinner. She is 11 years old and prefers to play football outside but her family is very strict she.

The family had to move here when their fabric and saree business was interrupted by the Covid-19 outbreak. Life in the village is cheaper, so they manage to pay the school fees of their three daughters.

Oishee is the youngest and auspicious talisman of the family. Born in 2011, she was named one of the 7 billionth babies in the world.

She had no idea what was going to happen to her mother. She didn’t even expect to give birth that day. She was taken for an emergency cesarean section after a doctor’s visit.

Oishee was born a minute after midnight, surrounded by TV crews and local officials who flocked to see him. The family was surprised but delighted.

Although her father is expecting a son, she is now happy with her three smart, hardworking daughters. The eldest is in college and Oishee is determined to become a doctor.

“We’re not doing that well, covid has made things harder,” he says. “But I will do anything to make his dream come true.”

Since Oishee was born, another 17 million people have been added to Bangladesh’s growing population.

This growth is due to a great medical success story, but the pace of expansion of Bangladesh has slowed sharply. In 1980 a woman had on average more than six children, now she has less than two. This was thanks to the country’s emphasis on education. As women become more educated, they prefer to have smaller families.

This is crucial to understanding where the world’s population is likely headed. The three main bodies that make global population estimates, the UN, the Institute for Health Measurements and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington, and the IIASA-Wittgenstein Center in Vienna differ in their hoped-for gains in education. .

The UN says the global population will peak at 10.4 billion people in the 2080s, but IHME and Wittgenstein believe it will be earlier, between 2060 and 2070, to less than 10 billion.

But these are just predictions. A lot has changed in the world since Oishee was born in 2011, and demographers are constantly surprised.

“We didn’t expect the AIDS death rate to drop so low, that treatment would save so many people,” says IIASA demographer Samir KC.

It had to change its model because an improvement in infant mortality rates has a long-term impact as surviving children continue to have children.

And then there are the surprising declines in fertility.

Samir KC says demographers are shocked that the number of children born per woman in South Korea has dropped to an average of 0.81.

“And how low can it go? That’s the big question for us.”

It is a reality that more and more countries will have to contend with.

While half of the next billion people will come from just eight countries, mostly in Africa, most countries will have a fertility rate of less than 2.1 children per woman, the number needed to sustain a population.

6 billionth

In Bosnia and Herzegovina, one of the world’s fastest-decreasing populations, 23-year-old Adnan Mevic thinks a lot about this issue.

“There will be no one left to pay the pensions,” he says.

“All the young people will be gone.”

He has a master’s degree in economics and is looking for a job. If not, it will go to the European Union.

Like many parts of Eastern Europe, his country has suffered the double blow of low fertility and high immigration.

Adnan lives in the suburbs of Sarajevo with his mother, Fatima, who has surreal memories of the birth of her son.

“I noticed something unusual was happening as the doctors and nurses were meeting, but I didn’t understand what was going on,” she recalls.

When Adnan was born, then-UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan was there to call him the 6 billionth baby on the planet.

“I was so tired I don’t know how I felt,” Fatima says with a laugh.

Adnan and his mother rummage through their photo albums. In one of the photos, a little boy is sitting in front of a giant cake surrounded by men in suits.

“Politicians visited me while other kids were throwing birthday parties,” Adnan says.

But it also had its advantages. Being the world’s 6 billionth baby led to her being invited at the age of 11 to meet her hero, Cristiano Ronaldo, in Real Madrid.

Adnan finds it impressive that the world’s population has increased by two billion people in 23 years.

“It really is too much,” he says.

“I don’t know how our beautiful planet will last.”