But big surges have been predicted before and they haven‘t always been right. In 1965 the government‘s demographers and statisticians projected that the population in 2001 would be 75 million. They were wrong. It was 58,789,194 on census day in 2001. Or, to be fair, the projection did not come to pass. That‘s the difference between a prediction and a projection. A prediction is an assertion that a certain event will happen. A projection is a calculation based on certain trends continuing for a certain period.
Four decades ago, those in the know seemed sure the UK was facing a massive population surge and that it would struggle to cope. In August 1966, Cambridge agriculture professor Sir Joseph Hutchinson warned that the population was already “as great as the environment can support without degenerationŽ.
Dropping birth rate
Demographics was a burning issue. Figures were gripped by a fear that Britain might be swamped, unable to produce enough food to sustain its burgeoning population. But the 60s represented the end of the baby boom. By the end of the decade, effective contraception was a fact of life, abortion had been made available and women were entering the workplace, many choosing career over children. In 1965, the UK population of 54,349,500 augmented by a much higher total fertility rate than now. In England and Wales, the rate in 1965 was 2.85. In 2006 the rate, despite recent increases, was only 1.87.
But the mistakes of the past do not mean the projections made last week should be ignored. Global projections have been much more reliable, with figures from the 60s fairly close to today‘s population. Perhaps that is what has given the UN the confidence to take its projections as far as 2300. Demographers can never know what new wave of migration, social upheaval or technological development is around the corner. At the end of the 18th Century, Thomas Malthus said “the power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for manŽ and predicted catastrophe. Then the industrial revolution happened. Demography is a difficult business indeed.
