Dire warnings that Nigeria’s exponential population growth might develop into a social disaster have gone largely unheeded. Occasionally, though, when prompted by the scary projections, the government makes pronouncements, blowing hot air to assuage the concerns of the multilateral agencies. The absence of political will to implement them could be seen in the fresh alarm from European groups over the unchecked procreation here. In the face of dwindling resources, there is a need for a paradigm shift to contain the untamed population growth.
Although the government vacillates on our demographic debacle, there is mounting evidence that it is a matter of time before the burgeoning birth pattern will start to threaten the country’s wellbeing. In this context, the alarm raised by the British High Commissioner to Nigeria, Paul Arkwright, at a tripartite conference organised by two NGOs and the British High Commission on the issue in Abuja, is a salient reminder that urgent action is needed.
Among other poignant observations, Arkwright says the biggest threat to Nigeria’s future is in the area of demographics. Bluntly, he said, “… there is a scenario of a demographic disaster” in the making, especially with so many young people jobless, the lack of access to health programmes and competition for resources.
In its 2016 estimates, the National Bureau of Statistics put Nigeria’s population at 193.3 million. For a country with a population of 55.6 million, according to 1963 census, the increase has been phenomenal. In 2006 – the last time a census was conducted – the Nigeria Population Commission released a figure of 140.4 million. Ten years on, Nigeria is the seventh most populous country in the world.
Put differently, Nigeria is 2.35 per cent of the world’s population, says the United Nations, or one in every 43 people in the world is a Nigerian. This speaks volumes about the country’s fertility rate: it is far higher than the replacement level, which demographic experts describe as the level in which a population naturally replenishes itself from one generation to the next. It indicates worryingly that population control is a delicate issue in Nigeria, laced with cultural and religious mines. This inhibits frontal action to limit population growth by the authorities.
At a birth rate of 2.7 per cent, the trend portends socio-economic doom. By 2060, Nigeria would have overtaken Pakistan, Brazil, Indonesia and the United States, leapfrogging to the third position behind India and China. The World Economic Forum estimates that by that year – about 42 years away – Nigeria’s population would stand at 473 million, higher than that of the US, which is estimated to be 403 million from the present 327 million. At the end of the century, Nigeria might have 900 million people, Arkwright warned. This is a Doomsday scenario, but it could happen with the current rush to procreate.
Already, the stiff competition for resources is overwhelming. The NBS notes that 15.9 million Nigerians are currently jobless, with the rate of unemployment and underemployment standing at 18.8 and 21.2 per cent respectively. In total, unemployment is 52.65 per cent. A large percentage lacks access to adequate healthcare, with Nigeria tagged notoriously as the worst place in the world to be born. It has the highest number of out-of-school children in the world.
Poorly educated families start procreating early – some girls as early as 10 years of age. Absurdly, they see family planning as the ploy of the Western world to make them sterile. So, the normal for them is for a woman to bear six to seven children on the average, at times before they reach the age of 25. In the process, many are afflicted with serious health problems.
By contrast, in most of Europe, the population is shrinking, which is another disaster on its own. Continent-wide data records one European woman having an average of 1.6 children. Portugal, for instance, currently has a population of 10.5 million; it is projected to drop to 6.5 million by 2060. Germany has the lowest birth rate in that continent with an average rate of 8.221 births per thousand inhabitants per year, in the five years to 2016, says the country’s Federal Office of Statistics and the Hamburg Institute of International Economics.
So, how does Nigeria strike a balance? To cut down on the soaring projections, religion should be put to good use. Religious leaders need to be carried along in the project. In turn, the message of birth control will cascade down to their adherents. Governments should invest in birth control initiatives, which have to be persuasive, consistent and penetrative.
It is possible for the political leadership to drive the initiative by limiting the size of their families. For 35 years, China operated a one-child policy until it was relaxed in 2013, and scrapped finally in 2015. It was an extreme law, but it worked in that by 2060, India, which has a loose population control policy, would have overtaken China as the world’s most populous country. While Nigeria might not go that far, it can modify the policy, allowing up to four children per family, as an earlier military regime once recommended. Families who obey the rule should be given incentives that will give some advantages to their children, maybe in education.
In any event, everybody is a victim of a bloated population: there is reduced access and enormous pressure on resources. The ministries of health should review the birth control policy in the area of post-natal health of women, with both the male and female made to be aware of the dangers of women having too many children, or having children too early.
