On October 31, the world symbolically welcomes its 7 billionth. The real date the world hits that number is up for debate, but it has been symbolically chosen by the United Nations as a way to emphasize the effects a growing population will have on the globe.
Over the past half of a century, the world has rapidly accelerated in population growth. In 1800, the Earth had about 1 billion people, 2 billion by 1927 and 3 billion in 1959. A little more than 40 years later, our population doubled.
Babatunde Osotimehin, the executive director of the UNFPA noted some great statistics in the United Nations Population Fund report, “State of World Population 2011.” He says,
Today, there are 893 million people over the age of 60 worldwide. By the middle of this century that number will rise to 2.4 billion. About one in two people lives in a city, and in only about 35 years, two out of three will. People under the age of 25 already make up 43 percent of the world’s population, reaching as much as 60 percent in some countries.
In nearly every presentation I give, regardless if I’m discussing gold, emerging markets, energy or the U.S. Global Investors’ funds, I show this population S-curve. To me, this dramatically rising line illustrates the significance of the world’s population on commodity consumption, rising gold demand and infrastructure buildout taking place in every continent.
Watch the countdown to 7 billion here: worldometers.info.
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