INowRegretThesePosts's Journal: Overpopulation is a myth

There is no global overpopulation. Some places (such as Japan) are already experiencing population aging and decline, which is bad in many ways. Other places (such as the USA and specially Europe) already have sub-replacement fertility rates, and their population only grows because of demographic lag and immigration. It is predicted the the European Union population (now at 503M) will reach zero natural population increase by 2015 and zero total population increase in 2035 (at 520M), then start declining.

The USA will grow from 310M in 2010 to 403M in 2050. [1]
Asia will increase from 4.2B in 2010 to 5.1B in 2050, then start declining. [2]

The only region that is really growing is Africa. It will increase from 1B in 2010 to 2.2B in 2050. [2] Then its population density will be 73/km2. [3] Compare that to the current population density in Portugal (115/km2), in South Korea (487/km2) and in Taiwan (641/km2). [4]

Global population is predicted to grow from 7B in 2011 to 9B in 2050 and 10B in 2100 [5] and start falling soon after [6].

And according to [7], 40-50% of America-produced food is thrown away. According to [8], 1/3 of the world food is thrown away.
And this does not take into account that people eat, just for pleasure, excessive quantities of resource-intensive food (such as meat). If Americans/Europeans want to help the poor, an easy way would be to decrease (say, by 30%) their diet of meat. This will immediately reduce food demand and, for double bonus, the saved money can be donated to charity. And much arable land is wasted on subsidized inefficient corn-based ethanol. You can lobby your government to stop that.

Plus, there does not seem to be a negative correlation between population density and GDP per capita. [9]

African hunger is not caused by overpopulation. It is caused by corrupt and authoritarian governments, and by guerrillas/terrorists motivated by Marxism, Islamism, ethnic hate or simply greed.

Overpopulation fear-mongering is very old - at least as old as Malthus. One of its more recent incarnations was the 1968 book "The Population Bomb", which predicted mass starvation to occur in the 1970s.

Anyway, for better or for worse, there is already strong action taken by individuals, foundations, and Western governments, to restrict fertility in Africa.

1 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_11.htm
2 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_2.htm
3 : According to [2], Africa will have 2.2B people in 2050, and according to Google[10] and Wikipedia [11], the area of Africa is 30,221,532 km2
4 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_population_density
5 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_1.htm
6 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_6.htm
7 : http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/news/ng.asp?id=56376-us-wastes-half
8 : http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/74192/icode/
9 : http://sanamagan.wordpress.com/2011/03/10/population-population-density-gdp-per-capita-ppp/
10 : https://www.google.com.br/search?q=africa+area
11 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africa

Don't forget who paid for it all

[Wonko the Sane]

African hunger is not caused by overpopulation. It is caused by corrupt and authoritarian governments, and by guerrillas/terrorists motivated by Marxism, Islamism, ethnic hate or simply greed.

Those corrupt and authoritarian governments were only made possible by the financial support of Western governments and NGOs.

Over the last half century the developed world has spent $50 trillion in Africa, all of which just made the situation worse. You can look at that $50 trillion as the cost of keeping Africa poor a