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(Series 4-2: The Realistic Need for One Family in the World)
January 1,2022
Austin Kuan
India is not a major player on the international stage. Despite having a population of 1.35 billion in 2021, second only to China's 1.4 billion, its first gold medal in the Olympics was awarded in 2021. On August 6, 2016, it was won by Neeraj Chopra in the javelin competition. From this, it is clear that India's total population does not exhibit a relatively symmetrical national power. Although India's Bollywood films are frequently excellent, and Indian mathematics and software design talents have a place in the global science and technology community, India is strictly speaking a regional power in South Asia or the Indian Ocean, with little influence on the rest of the world.
However, India's total population will reach 1.64 billion by 2050, nearly 300 million more than in 2021; at the same time, China's population will decline from 1.44 billion in 2021 to 1.4 billion in 2050, making India the world's most populous country in 2050, with a population of 240 million more than China.
India's land area is only one-third that of China's, but it will house a population of 1.64 billion people in the future. This is not what the senior Indian government wants to see. It is unavoidable that it will implement a birth control policy. However, because India is a democratic system, it cannot impose the "one-child" policy, as China has done since 1979. When a society's economic development is relatively unstable, women tend to increase childbirth to protect their and their families' futures; when a society becomes prosperous, having children becomes a matter of increasing family expenses. Furthermore, when pregnancy reduces a woman's competitiveness in the labor market, she is more likely to have fewer children or even not marry. The former describes what is happening in Africa and southern Asia between now and 2050, while the latter describes what is happening in Europe, America, China, and East Asia. Given the current state of India's economic development, implementing a birth control policy will be difficult. It will still have a population of more than 1.6 billion people by 2050.
Pakistan and Bangladesh, India's two neighbors, whose overall economic standards lag far behind India's, and where the fertility rate is naturally high. It is expected that by 2050, these two Islamic countries will have grown by 150 million people.
As a result, the entire "subcontinent" of South Asia will grow by 450 million people between now and 2050. These new populations will encourage more South Asians to migrate to Europe and the United States. The main reason is that the living ecological environment in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh is deteriorating. The Indian peninsula is currently the world's most polluted region. One of the most important reasons is that coal-fired power generation accounts for 70% of India's electricity generation. Greenpeace estimates that New Delhi, India's capital, is the most polluted city in the world by 2020. It is said that up to 54,000 people died as a result of the suffocating air. Bangladesh is the world's most severely flooded country. Pakistan's political situation has always been volatile, and the Taliban's forces are further complicating matters. In such a vulnerable political, economic, and ecological environment, these three countries will have an additional 450 million people in the future, making the existing living environment difficult to load, and people with greater economic ability will be more willing to emigrate. Because South Asia was once ruled by the British Empire, wealthy people from India and Pakistan prefer to immigrate to London, whereas high-tech talent prefers to immigrate to Silicon Valley in the United States.
As stated in the previous article, the African continent's population will rise from 1.2 billion to at least 2.5 billion people between 2021 and 2050. A total of 1.75 billion people will be added to the Indian peninsula's population as a result of the three countries' population growth. The total new population of 1.75 billion is the main source of the future increase in the global population. These new huge populations are not white in terms of race color; in terms of religious distribution, Islam and Hinduism account for more than half of the ratio; in the mobile area, 99 percent of the people prefer to consider countries that currently believe in Christianity or Catholicism, such as the European Union, the United States, and Canada. Consider that among the 1.75 billion people who will be added to Africa and South Asia by 2050, if 50 million of the total population emigrates to Europe and the United States, it will be enough to turn Europe and the United States upside down. The American portion will be covered in the following article.
The current population of the United Kingdom is approximately 67 million, with 8.5 million immigrants accounting for approximately 13% of the population. Many immigrants to the United Kingdom performed well, leading to Pakistani Sadiq Aman Khan's election as mayor of London in May 2016 and re-election in May 2021. If the UK does not accept new immigrants, its population will remain around 67 million by 2050, but it will be significantly older. More importantly, the fertility rate of the original immigrants far exceeds the traditional definition of British, implying that by 2050, immigrants and their children will account for more than 20% of the British population. Although the previous article stated that immigrants make a positive contribution to a country, not everyone agrees. If the UK accepts new immigrants in order to avoid future population aging, immigrants and their descendants will account for more than 30% of the UK's population. This is a nearly unavoidable trend. Britain, France, and Germany are all dealing with the same issue. Is society as a whole beginning to take this issue seriously?
It should be noted that no one has taken the time to discuss this issue thus far. The second outbreak of the new crown pneumonia has caused concern in European countries, and the immigration issue is now flashing. Politicians don't have time to consider demographic trends from now to 2050. After all, the people have the power to vote.
Immigrants are a valuable asset, but the movement of refugees as a result of war or disaster is the issue. The European Union and the United States must seriously consider a critical issue: the future of homeland security. The issue is not in the United States, but in Africa and South Asia. Politicians require votes to be supported, but the people's vision must also be adjusted from the domestic to the foreign, or the next generation's living space in Europe and the United States will be severely challenged. If Europe and the United States no longer regard Africa as a place of backwardness or arms dumping, if Europe and the United States are willing to pay attention to the fragility of South Asia's ecological environment, and if Europe and the United States are willing to assist in the sound development of Africa and South Asia, the additional 1.75 billion people can be safe and secure. Even if 50 million immigrants want to move, Europe and the United States can consider how to accept them through careful planning to compensate for the country's aging population and labor shortage.
If, over time, European and American societies can gradually integrate non-white, Islamic, or Hindu immigrants into society at a peaceful and healthy pace, European and American countries will experience the next wave of growth. The ability of remote Africa and South Asia to develop soundly determines whether the current high standard of living of the European and American people can be sustained, not the replacement of political parties caused by the current elections.
Will the above vision come true? Of course, it will, but the likelihood is low. Africa and South Asia were, after all, European colonies. Can European countries and the United States both respect them equally? In fact, it is pessimistic. Let us consider another scenario. If Europe and the United States do not value peace and stability in Africa and South Asia, these regions will remain economically underdeveloped, with frequent wars and diseases, and the collapse of the ecological environment, causing at least 50 million people to see Europe and the United States as a haven for refugees. How can Europe and the United States prevent the movement of these 50 million, if not 100 million, people between now and 2050? Ten to twenty thousand people may be handled well if a large number of refugees break through the European Union's barbed wire fence in Greece or Poland, or climb the wall on the US-Mexico border. What if there are millions of people present at the same time? At that point, all barbed wire fences and walls are rendered ineffective.
To be honest, the EU and the US face a very dangerous future in the face of the 1.75 billion people who will be added to Africa and South Asia by 2050. The EU, in particular, will undoubtedly face upheaval changes that will cause people to break out in cold sweat. We used to say that "the world is one family." In fact, the nature of the slogan is more important than the content. The world is clearly divided into "developed" and "developing" countries. However, if Europe and the United States do not regard "one family in the world" as the same thing in the future, until 2050, and continue to focus their minds on fighting against specific countries, they are aiming at the wrong target. The concept of a global family will no longer be an ideal in the future, but rather a high degree of necessity in terms of political reality and national security. If we do not recognize this, the incredible number of refugees will undoubtedly destroy Europe and the United States in the future. Whether these 50 million, or even 100 million, people can become orderly immigrants or refugees who break through barbed wire or fences is dependent on the European Union's and the United States' future visions.