Conceptual Understanding:
Key Question:
What are the population possibilities and power over the decision-making process?
Key Content:
- Global and regional/continental trends in family size, sex ratios and ageing populations.
- Policies to manage population change that focus on policies related to ageing societies and pro-natalist or anti-natalist policies.
- Policies to manage population change that focus on gender equality policies and anti-trafficking policies.
- The demographic dividend and the ways in which population could be considered a resource when contemplating possible futures.
- One case study of a country benefiting from a demographic dividend.
Synthesis, evaluation and skills opportunities:
How population change may affect the power balance between groups of people at local, national and international scales.
Tuesday 15 October 2024
Global and Regional Demographic Trends
Trend 1. Family Size
Family size may be measured using household data. A household is a group of persons who make common provision of food, shelter and other essentials for living. Households are at the centre of many demographic, social and economic processes, since decisions about childbearing, living arrangements, education and health care, labour force participation, migration and savings often are made at the household level.
The size of households ranges widely — In Gambia an average household consists of nearly 14 people, while in Germany and Sweden that number is just under three — but the global average is around 4.9 people per household.
Task 1. Using the graphic above, describe the distribution of household size around the world.
Trend 2. Sex Ratio
In anthropology and demography, the human sex ratio is the ratio of males to females in a population. More data are available for humans than for any other species, and the human sex ratio is more studied than that of any other species, but interpreting these statistics can be difficult.
The sex ratio for the entire world population in 2022 is 102 males to 100 females. This equates to approximately 44 million males worldwide.
Gender imbalance may arise as a consequence of various factors including natural factors, exposure to pesticides and environmental contaminants, war casualties, sex-selective abortions, infanticides, aging, and deliberate gendercide.
Task 2. Watch the video linked below.
Task 3. Research the sex ratio for China and UAE. Write down their sex ratio score. Why do you think their sex ratio is so variable compared to the global average?
Task 4. Read this article from the BBC and explain why Sweden has an ever larger imbalance than China.
Task 5. Click here to read about the issues caused by sex-selective abortion in Armenia. Take some notes on the impacts of this activity on the demographics of the country.
Trend 3. Ageing Populations
From issues such as declining fertility rates to the ongoing complications resulting from China’s famous “One Child Policy”, there are many demographic challenges that the world must grapple with in the coming years.
Task 6. Take a look at this interactive which shows the average age of the global population. What is happening to the average age of the global population?
Task 7. Click here to be taken the The Slate website and an excellent article on Ageing Populations. Check out the different characteristics (2010, 2050, 2100) and then complete a piece of commentary describing the spatial distribution of ageing / greying and explaining this spreading trend.
Take a note of the data for Canada, Germany, Ethiopia and China for the three different date ranges.
Thursday 17 October 2024
Population Policies
The next couple of lessons will investigate how population change may affect the power balance between groups of people at local, national and international scales.
For this task you will each investigate one of the following policies and create a ONE page information infographic about it which you will distribute to the other class members. You will also create FOUR exam style questions to go with the infographic.
Infographic Exam Questions
Question 1 – Should be a simple identify/state question where you need to identify a statistic/piece of data from the infographic. Worth 1 mark.
Question 2 – Should be a data manipulation question where you need to calculate a statistic/piece of data from the infographic. Worth 1 mark.
Question 3 – Should be an explanation question where you need to suggest a reason for a trend indentifed in the infographic. Worth 2 marks.
Question 4 – Should be a to what extent type question where you need to give evidence from the infographic to support/refute a statement.
Population Policy Case Studies
- Pro-Natalist Policies – Denmark and Sweden
- Ageing Populations – Japan
- Gender Equality – Iceland
- Anti-Trafficking – Blue Dragon, Vietnam
Case Study #1. Pro-Natalist Policies – Denmark and Sweden
Denmark and Sweden, like many other European countries has seen a decline in its overall fertility rates since the baby boom of the 1960’s. These falling fertility rates have been caused by an increase by the continued empowerment of women and advanced family planning schemes. The graph below shows the patterns and trends in fertility rates in Scandanavian countries since the mid-1960’s.
Task 1. Using the graph below, describe the pattern of fertility rates in Denmark and Sweden since 1960.
To combat this below replacement level fertility issue, the Danish government have launched a number of initiatives to encourage their population to reproduce more.
Task 2. Read this article and take notes on the scheme of teaching Danish students to have more babies.
Task 3. Read this article and take some notes on why the residents of the Danish town of Thy have been encouraged to do their bit to help!
Denmark then took this policy one stage further than most other countries would dare to and released a series of adverts making it very clear what the only solution to the fertility problem was …… and encouraging their population to get to work to solve the problem!
Task 4. Watch both of the videos linked below carefully. Remember that this is good Geography and take notes on the methods used to encourage people to have more children.
Task 5. Read this review of the campaign from The Independent and make notes on the successes of the ‘Do it for Denmark’ campaign.
Task 6. Read the following articles to find out how Sweden has tried to increase fertility rates and the impact that these policies have had on the country.
Case Study #2. Ageing Populations – Japan
Why we should take care with ageing?
The longevity effect is essentially a measure of how biological aging has changed in relation to chronological age. One consequence of this change is that the standard chronological measure of age makes less sense than ever. In the US, a 75-year-old today has the same mortality rate as a 65-year-old in 1952. Similarly, in Japan, 80 is the “new 65.” As an actuarial matter, then, today’s 75-year-olds are not any older than the 65-year-olds of the 1950s.
However, we should be careful not to treat ageing as a stand alone problem and must move away from nominal measures of age that treat older people as a problem. Perhaps it is time to stop worrying about “ageing societies” and start focusing on the type of demographic change that really matters. Some might say that governments should provide those in a position to reap the benefits of longer, healthier lives with opportunities to do so, while minimizing the number of people who are denied longevity. By investing in a longevity dividend, countries can reduce the supposed threat of an ageing society.
Impacts
- Ageing populations have multiple impacts:
- Increase costs on residential accommodation, social services, health care, and pensions
- Services such as schools, sports centres, etc. decline as they are not used by older residents
- Family budgets can increase if looking after an aged relative
- There is an increase in the dependency ratio because of a smaller working population
- A smaller workforce means less tax paid to the government leading to less money available to the younger population for education, transport, social amenities etc.
- Ageing populations can also present opportunities such as:
- Lower costs on policing as crime rates reduce
- New market/business opportunities
- In HICs, the elderly are an important market, known as the ‘grey economy’
- Firms now cater to this market through holidays (SAGA), mobility aids, health care workers etc.
- Increased opportunities for volunteering and community activism as elderly people have experience
- Longer working lives and contribution to society
- More time can be spent with friends and family and providing care for family members
- In Japan and South Africa, there is a ‘granny culture’, where the elderly look after their grandchildren, allowing both parents to work.
Trends in Japan
- More than 1 in 10 people in Japan are now aged 80+, and there are approximately 80 000 centenarians (100+ years)
- This makes Japan the country with the world’s oldest population
- By 2036, people 65+ years will represent 33% of the population
- Japan has a low birth rate and struggles to provide for its ageing population
- In 2022, almost half of Japanese firms relied on workers aged 70+
- Farmers are also ageing and Japan’s farming population is shrinking and the agricultural sector faces a severe labour shortage
- A shrinking child population is forcing local governments around Japan to close its schools
- The decrease in the size of the youth population reduces competition among young people
Watch the video and take notes on the issues faced in Japan and how the country aims to effectively deal with this demographic issue.
Japan’s policies
- The government has tried to boost its birth rates
- But, with the cost of living, and long working hours, there has been little success
- The pandemic only worsened the issues, leading to more deaths, and fewer marriages and births
- Japan created the ‘Angel Plan’ aimed to help couples raise their children by:
- Increasing policies and programmes for paid parental leave, childcare services and child allowances
- In 2019, free preschool education and day-care for children aged 3-5 was introduced
- In 2020, the government increased support by:
- Reduces the cost of fertility treatment
- Raised child allowances
- Expanded free higher education
- Introduced higher allowances for paternity leave – at present Japan has a generous paid parental leave of up to 24 months
- But so far, these policies have not improved Japan’s low fertility rate of 1.36 births per woman
- Improve immigration
- Japan has a strict immigration policy
- Migrants are considered temporary ‘guest workers’ who will eventually return home
- Many Japanese firms resist hiring foreign workers
- In 2018, new legislation allowed foreign workers with vocational skills to stay in the country for up to 5 years, but could not bring their families
- If the foreign worker had advanced skills, then they were allowed to bring their families and live in the country indefinitely
- In June 2023, just 2.4% of the total Japanese population were foreign residents (3.2 million people)
- This also applies to refugees, where just 202 people were granted refugee status out of 3,772 people who applied in 2022
- Create an ‘age-free’ society
- Japan is looking at creating an ‘age-free society’ where people are not categorised by their age, but by their ability and motivation to work
- They are encouraging employers to:
- Keep their employees up to the age of 70 or longer
- Hire older people
- Extent their retirement age
- Increase opportunities for older people
Case Study #3. Gender Equality – Iceland
You will have seen much in the news recently about the disparity between wages between men and women in similar employment positions. This has resulted in protest actions such as the ‘Equal Pay Day’ movement which is the time in the year where women effectively stop earning relative to men because of the gender pay gap.
Iceland has recently become the first country to outlaw this wage disparity.
Task 1. Watch the video below and the articles linked and take notes on their policy.
Task 2. Watch the video below and comment on why the supposed gender pay gap might be misleading.
Task 3. Read this article from the BBC and take further notes on the effectiveness of this sort of policy and where else it may be rolled out. You may also want to check out the ‘Company Calculator’
Case Study #4. Anti-Trafficking – Blue Dragon, Vietnam
What is trafficking and why is it an issue?
Use the materials below to write definitions of:
- Human trafficking
- Labour trafficking
- Sex trafficking
Use data to explain the size of this issue worldwide.
- The International Labour Organization estimates that there are 20.9 million victims of human trafficking globally.
- 68% of them are trapped in forced labor.
- 26% of them are children.
- 55% are women and girls.
- The International Labor Organization estimates that forced labor and human trafficking is a $150 billion industry worldwide.
- The U.S. Department of Labor has identified 139 goods from 75 countries made by forced and child labor.
Sex Trafficking
Sex trafficking is a form of modern slavery that exists throughout the United States and globally. Sex traffickers use violence, threats, lies, debt bondage, and other forms of coercion to compel adults and children to engage in commercial sex acts against their will. The situations that sex trafficking victims face vary dramatically. Some victims become involved with someone who then forces or manipulates them into prostitution. Others are lured in with false promises of a job, such as modeling or dancing. Some are forced to sell sex by their parents or other family members. They may be involved in a trafficking situation for a few days or weeks, or may remain in the same trafficking situation for years.
Labour trafficking
Labour traffickers – including recruiters, contractors, employers, and others – use violence, threats, lies, debt bondage, or other forms of coercion to force people to work against their will in many different industries. Labour traffickers often make false promises of a high-paying job or exciting education or travel opportunities to lure people into horrendous working conditions. Yet, victims find that the reality of their jobs proves to be far different than promised and must frequently work long hours for little to no pay. Their employers exert such physical or psychological control – including physical abuse, debt bondage, confiscation of passports or money – that the victim believes they have no other choice but to continue working for that employer.
Key aspects of the United Nations approach to trafficking are listed below (these are taken from the Global Initiative to Fight human Trafficking or GIFT Report which you can read in full above):
- Raise awareness—inform the world of this crime and mobilize people to stop it
- Strengthen prevention—warn vulnerable groups and alleviate the factors that make people vulnerable to trafficking, such as poverty, underdevelopment and lack of opportunity
- Reduce demand—attack the problem at its source by lowering incentives to trade and decreasing demand for the products and services of exploited people
- Support and protect victims—ensure housing, counselling, medical, psychological and material assistance, keeping in mind the special needs of women and children and people at risk, such as those in refugee camps and conflict zones
- Improve law enforcement—strengthen information exchange between law enforcement agencies on international trafficking routes and traffickers´ profiles in order to dismantle criminal groups, leading to the conviction of traffickers
- Implement international commitments—ensure that international agreements are turned into national laws and practice by assisting countries in need and improving the monitoring of compliance
- Enrich knowledge—deepen world understanding of the scope and nature of human trafficking through more data collection and analysis, joint research initiatives and the creation of an evidence-based report on global trafficking trends
- Strengthen partnerships—build up regional and thematic networks involving civil society, inter-governmental organizations and the private sector
- Create a special purpose fund—to attract and leverage resources into funding projects around the world committed to ending human trafficking
- Create an informal contact group—to give like-minded Member States ownership of the process and create long-term momentum.
Blue Dragon – Vietnam
Use this website to research information to answer the following questions:
- Location, the nature of the problem and the goals of the project
- Strategies used to tackle the problem
- Impact and evaluation:
- What have been the successes?
- What still needs to be done/what are the limitations?
Tuesday 22 October 2024
Starter: Share your policy posters/infographics/summary sheets with each other.
The Demographic Dividend…
This last piece of work in the population unit will be taking us to Ethiopia to study the impacts of the demographic dividend on the country. IB requires a brief case study of the impacts of the demographic dividend on the country.
Task 1. Click here to be taken to a site that explains the concept of the demographic dividend in more depth.
You may also use the longer video below as an additional source of information and to broaden your understanding.
i. Define the term demographic dividend.
ii. Outline four benefits of the demographic dividend.
iii. What may stop a country from benefiting from the demographic dividend?
Task 2. Download this Google Doc which outlines a summary of the demographic dividend in Ethiopia. On your copy of the article, highlight the demographic changes (and associated data) and the three key areas of improvement within the country.
Homework: Complete the Check Your Understanding Questions for both Section B and Section C which can be found on pages 408 and 423.