Asia-Pacific Population Journal - Volume 21, Issue 3, 2007

Every country in the Asian and Pacific region is in the midst of a demographic transition that is producing large changes in age structure with important implications for economic growth and standards of living. In the early stages of the transition, high fertility and declining infant and child mortality produce a bulge in the population at young ages. The middle of the transition is marked by an increase in the share of the population concentrated at the working ages as large cohorts of children reach adulthood and as the relative number of children are depressed by fertility decline. At the end of the transition, the share of the older population increases. In part, this is a consequence of continued reductions in mortality rates, but of greater consequence are the low fertility rates that characterize the final stages of the demographic transition.

Several decades ago, the discussion on population and development focused on the large size and high growth rate of the population, resulting from rapidly declining mortality rates and continuing high fertility which leads to population explosion. Controlling of infectious diseases through the diffusion of public health programmes and the availability of modern antibiotics invented in Western countries were some of the key factors in declining mortality rates in developing countries including those in Asia (Hirschman, 2005).

Increased life expectancy and rapid fertility decline since the 1970s have combined to create a very rapid rate of population ageing in China. These demographic developments are expected to result in an ageing workforce and a significant slow-down in the growth of the working-age population. According to the United Nations medium variant population projection, the size of the working age population will increase only slightly over the next 10 years before beginning to shrink soon after 2020. Furthermore, since the participation rate of the elderly population is much lower than that of the prime-age labour force, ageing of the workforce will reduce the aggregate labour force participation rate (ALFPR).

This paper provides an overview of some important demographic changes in two major South Asian countries, India and Pakistan, resulting in a situation marked by sustained fertility decline, life prolongation and a growth of population in both the young (especially 25 years and over) and old (60 years and over) age groups. The study postulates that these changes may prove significant for both the countries – affecting, inter alia, the size and clearance mechanism of their labour markets, nature of dependencies, increasing ratios of young to old, etc. The study further postulates that a fair proportion of families in the two countries may find it difficult to endure old-age dependencies owing to increasingly widespread casualization of employment and jobless growth. Enduring old-age dependencies may also be difficult due to limited work opportunities for older persons, functional disabilities, perpetuating poverty, lack of social assistance, compression in real public health expenditure, etc. The study also postulates that the pro-market changes in these countries may not particularly conform to their age structure changes. It may as well create a situation fraught with a significant economic-demographic mismatch (see appendix 1).

As in many other Asian countries, norms regarding family life in East Java have changed and will continue to change with the forces of globalization. Family structures used to be the pillars for the support of children and older persons. However, the declining fertility, rising mobility and rising female labour force are changing as are norms regarding the family. Therefore, the question arises as to who and how will the society finance the care of its elderly?

Thai people’s life expectancy has risen from 59 to 72 years between 1964 and 2005 (Prasartkul and Vapattanawong, 2005), while the proportion of persons aged 60 years and over in Thailand has been dramatically increasing, from 4.6 per cent in 1960 to 9.5 per cent in 2000 (National Statistical Office (NSO), 1960 and 2000). It is expected that Thailand will face a “population ageing” crisis in the year 2017, when older persons will constitute approximately 14 per cent of the total population, an increase from 7 per cent in 1987 (Jitapunkul, 2000). In other words, the percentage of older persons will double within 30 years and will further increase to 25 per cent of the total in 2035, based on a recent population projection done by the Institute for Population and Social Research, Mahidol University (2006). This means that Thailand has only a relatively short time to prepare to respond to the various challenges brought about the greying of its population and in particular issues related to the health, welfare, housing and long-term care of older persons.