Population growth and economic development

Since 1950, population growth rates in developing countries have averaged around 2 per cent per year, enough to double the size of a country’s population in 35 years. The calculation is not merely hypothetical; the population of the developing world (Africa, Latin America and Asia, except Japan) has in fact doubled between 1950, when it numbered 1.7 billion, and 1984, when it reached 3.6 billion.