World Population- an alarming call for Pakistan

The new world population datasheet has been released recently by the US Population Reference Bureau
which has put Pakistan in an alarming situation. Pakistan's population is increasing into the manifold
with a fertility rate of 3.6. On the other hand, with a population of 1400m, India has still managed to
control its fertility rate to 2.2. With the most fertility rate of 4.5m, Afghanistan still has a population
under 40m due to a high mortality rate and low expectancy. With this increasing rate, it will get difficult
for Pakistan to cater to the needs of the burgeoning citizenry.

With this fertility rate, it is expected that the population of Pakistan will get doubled in the next few
decades. Pakistan has not put enough effort or resources to control the population. Yet, due to lack of
adequate education, we still have not achieved the so-called ‘demographic dividend’. As a result, more
unmanaged population growth will aggravate the situation of unemployment in developing countries
like Pakistan. Moreover, lack of knowledge and availability of contraception services, early marriages,
and inadequate space birth has further made the situation worse.

The other and more important factor behind the population growth is the dearth of social sector
spending and policies. It took Pakistan 19 years to create the census of the population which got
completed in 2017. Still, there is little evidence that census data was used to help in achieving more
effective population planning and other human development-related measures. Instead, the data is
used for the politicking and power-grabbing facilities.

This uncontrolled population growth in Pakistan is like a ticking time bomb. If the time measures will be
not taken, it will put Pakistan get in a dire situation. The state’s birth control programs and high social
sector funding are in a dire need to tackle this aggravated problem.