Population - AP Human Geo

Why is population important to study?

• more population on earth today than at any other time in history (8 billion)

• worlds population increased faster in second half of 20th century than ever before

• almost all global population growth is occurring in LDC’s … poorest countries growing the fastest…. in some cases leads to famine and human suffering

• people are living longer -past 50 years global life expectancy has increased by 20 years.

demography

the study of human population

how much is project population?

will plateau about 12 billion sometime in the 21st century

historically population has been..

steady but certain events have checked it

what is the biggest threat?

disease has been and continues to be the biggest

Ecumene

portion of Earth's surface occupied by permanent human settlement

how much of world population lives on Earth's surface?

¾ of world pop live on 5 % of earth surface

how much of the world lives in 4 regions?

2/3

East Asia

(China, Japan, Taiwan, Koreas)

• China has 20 large urban areas, but 2/3 population is rural

• China = worlds #2 population

• ¾ of Japan and Korea = urban

South Asia

(India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, sri Lanka)

India = worlds #1 population

¾ rural

Europe

east and west are mostly urban

SE Asia

(islands of Java, Sumatra, Borneo, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Vietnam, Thailand)

• Indonesia=worlds #4 population

• Mostly rural

top 10 populous nations

1. India

2. China

3. United States

4. Indonesia

5. Pakistan

6. Nigeria

7. Brazil

8. Bangladesh

9. Russia

10. Ethiopia