Earth’s population is getting 8 billion this month, how could all this happen?
This month the world’s population is about to touch the figure of 8 billion. (Representational photo: Wikimedia Commons)
Human population has increased very rapidly in the last 50 years. After human evolution, the number of us humans has reached till 1970, it is going to be twice this month, that is, we have going to have a global population of 8 billion. The beginning of human life on this earth is believed to be from 28 lakh years ago, but first agriculture, then in the last three centuries, due to the development of industrialization, medicine etc., the human population has increased wildly.
Highlights
⏩ This month the world’s population will cross 8 billion.
⏩ After the population explosion in the 19th century, the population grew very rapidly.
⏩ The world’s population has more than doubled in comparison to 1970.
The news is that this month the human population is going to cross 8 billion. In the 18th century itself, the total population of humans was 8 times less than the number of humans in the world. The human race originated on Earth 2 million years ago. Since then, the human population in the world has been increasing despite some interruptions in between, in which a remarkable population explosion has been seen only after the 19th century. But the growth of the human population reaching here is not a simple event.
28 million years ago to now?
Information from fossils suggests that the first humans lived in East Africa 2.8 million years ago. Since then, the evidence of history shows that the human population has only increased after facing all kinds of disasters and problems and in the 20th century such a population explosion has been seen that today we have become 8 billion.
Data problem
Nevertheless, it is true that we do not have reliable population figures before the 19th century, which does not give the correct picture. What we know reveals much more than that. In the beginning, humans used to do the work of hunters and food items only. They used to have few children.
People used to be less
Scientists say that due to their food requirements, due to the hunter and food gathering lifestyle, they needed a very large area, which used to be about 10 square kilometers for a person. But as soon as humans started settling in the settlement, along with the civilization, the population of the world also started increasing.
After the introduction of agriculture, the human population started increasing in the world. (symbolic photo: Shutterstock)
Role of agriculture
The population remained only gradually over time. Agriculture was the biggest contributor to this growing population because it helped in dealing with the problem of food for more and more people. Agriculture made it possible to store food and people also started getting nutritious food, due to which the birth rate also increased because women started living healthily and they did not have much trouble giving birth.
Problems did not subside
But many types of problems also came from the permanent settlements. Many types of diseases also came from keeping pets. In that period the death rate of children was high. One-third of the children died within a year and another one-third before the age of 18. According to estimates, from a population of six million in ten thousand BC, by 2000 BC, the population grew to about 100 million, and after that after the first AD, 250 million.
From the end of the 20th century till now, the world population is increasing very fast. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)
Due to pandemics and wars
In the 14th century, the Black Death worked to clean a large amount of the population in the world including Europe. Due to this, the population of about 43 crores of 1300 remained at only 37 crores. After this, for many centuries, sometimes epidemics and sometimes wars worked to reduce the population of the world. The 19th century saw an explosion in population, mainly due to the industrialization of medical science and agriculture.
The world’s population has increased eightfold since 1800. Many experts believe that its key is the development of life-saving medicines and vaccines. The smallpox vaccine is considered to be the most important in this. Apart from this, only one revolutionary change was seen in the decade of 1970 and 1980. The success of treatments in the treatment of heart also reduced the death rate drastically. Due to similar reasons the world is becoming 4 billion in 1975, 5 billion in 1987, 6 billion in 1999, 7 billion in 2011, and now 8 billion this month.
