According to the UN projection, which also points out that India will surpass China as the country with the largest population in 2023, the world population is expected to reach 8 billion on 15 November.

“The population milestone is a reminder of our shared responsibility to care for our planet and a time to reflect on what we owe to our mutual commitments,” said UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.

“This is an opportunity to celebrate our diversity, recognize our shared humanity, and marvel at advances in health that have extended life expectancy and dramatically reduced maternal and child mortality rates,” he added.

The projection of the UN Department of Economics and Social Affairs states that the world’s population is growing at the slowest rate since 1950.

The world is expected to reach a population of 8.5 billion in 2030 and 9.7 billion in 2050, reaching approximately 10.4 billion in the 2080s before stabilizing by 2100.

The UN report emphasizes that while there is a net decline in birth rates in developing countries, more than half of the projected growth in world population in the coming decades will be concentrated in eight countries.

The document states that these countries are the Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines and Tanzania.