ACTIVE LEARNING 1. What factors can lead to a country returning to the high fluctuating stage of the Demographic Transitional Model?


2. Using an example of a country you have studied, describe the characteristics of a country in Stage 2 of the Demographic Transitional Model.


3. Visit www.cso.ie for up-to-date statistics on the Irish population. If you have a Twitter account, you can follow @CSOIreland for tweets on the latest statistics and reports.


4. To visualise just how quickly population can change, visit www.worldometers.info/world-population for a ‘live clock’ of the world’s population. You can also click on individual countries to see their population change occurring.


5. What are the economic concerns of a country entering Stage 5 of the Demographic Transitional Model?


6. Using YouTube or Vimeo, search for ‘National Geographic 7 Billion’ for a wonderful visual presentation on population growth and the scale of population on our planet.


7. Use the internet to search for ‘Fawzia Koofi’, an Afghan women’s rights activist. 1.7 Population Pyramids and


Women in sub-Saharan Africa today are as likely to die in pregnancy or childbirth as were women in nineteenth-century England.


Dependency Ratio The structure of a country’s population changes greatly over time, which impacts on the needs and concerns of the people. Because of the constant change of population, the most accurate way to show the population trend in a country is through population pyramids. Population pyramids show us: l


What percentage of the population are economically active (paying tax) and dependent (Aged 0–14 and 65+)


l l


Despite the fact that it is against the law, there are over 37,000 children forced into marriage each year, most of whom are young girls who are forced to marry much older men.


The proportion of males and females The age of a country’s population.


As a country moves through the stages of the Demographic Transitional Model, the structure of its population changes. In Stages 1–3, there is a higher percentage of children and the population is quite young. As a country moves to Stage 4 and Stage 5, there are fewer young people and more elderly. There are three general shapes that population pyramids take: l


Progressive


90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0


6 Male


65+ 4.9%


Female Male 65+ 19.5% l Stationary Female l Regressive Male 65+ 35.7% Female


15–64 59.7%


15–64 66.6%


15–64 53.6%


0–14 35.4%


4 2 0 Millions 2 4 6 6 4 2


0–14 13.9%


0 Millions : Fig. 1.22 Population pyramids can be progressive, stationary or regressive. 20 ELECTIVE 5 PATTERNS AND PROCESSES IN THE HUMAN ENVIRONMENT 2 4 6 6 4 2


0–14 10.8%


0 Millions 2 4 6


90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0


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