Yes, One in Four People Are Expected to Live in Africa By 2100: New at Reason

Marain Tupy follows up on his previous column about population growth and the prospects for progress in Africa.

He writes:

In my Reason column last week, I wrote about Africa’s economic prospects in view of the continent’s explosive population growth. A number of readers wrote to me in response to the article and I will attempt to address their most important concerns below.

First, readers wondered if my population estimates reflected the expected changes to the total fertility rate (TFR) among African women. Indeed, they have. The population data in the original article came from the United Nation’s database, which adjusts for different fertility rate scenarios.

Holding TFR constant, the world would contain 26 billion people in 2100. Of those, 16 billion would live in Africa. Contrast that with the “low” fertility variant, which estimates a global population of 7.3 billion (3 billion in Africa). In my article, I referenced the “medium” fertility variant, which assumes a global population of 11.2 billion and African population of 4.4 billion.

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