Malawi could adopt China’s one child policy

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Population in Malawi keeps increasing: Photo: Fox news.
Population in Malawi keeps increasing: Photo: Fox news.

Population experts fear that Malawi could be forced to adopt China’s famous one child policy if the current population trend continues.

According to the United States of America (USA) population experts, Malawi’s current population will treble to a 40 Million record of people by 2040 if the current trend of child-birth is not urgently checked.

The news about the possible increase in population is attributed to the average five children per family policy in Malawi.

Speaking on Tuesday, experts at the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) dubbed the current population growth in Malawi as ‘worrisome’ and too much.

Peter Halpert
Peter Halpert: The trend is alarming.

Director for USAID Health Office in Malawi, Peter Halpert in his speech during the launch of the Family Planning Costed Implementation Plan (CIP) 2016 – 2020 in Lilongwe, said that there is need for the trend to be looked at before it gets out of hand.

He said the country’s population growth might be the most significant threat to Malawi’s long-term development and prosperity.

“Forty Million people is the estimated number of people that will be living in Malawi by the year 2040 if women continue to have five or more children in their families – that is more than double the current population,’’ he said.

According to a website called country metres website, as of 1 January 2016, the population of Malawi was estimated to be 17.7 million people.

This is an increase of 2.76 % compared to population of 17.2 million the year before. In 2015 the natural increase was positive, as the number of births exceeded the number of deaths by 476,942.

The sex ratio of the total population was 1.002 (1002 males per 1 000 females) which is lower than global sex ratio.

The global sex ratio in the world was approximately 1016 males to 1000 females as of 2015.

Below are the key figures for Malawi population in 2015:

• 705,142 live births

• 228,200 deaths

• Natural increase (Difference between deaths and live births): 476,942 people

• Net migration: 0 people

• 8,880,146 males as of 31 December 2015

• 8,858,532 females as of 31 December 2015