EA - Human Geography Lesson
Human Geography
Population Geography
At the beginning of the twentieth century, the world's population was about 1.6 billion. One hundred years later, there were six billion people in the world, and as of 2017, the number was between seven and eight billion. During the twentieth century, death rates due to disease and malnutrition decreased in every corner of the globe. Low death rates and high birth rates in developing (agriculturally based) countries resulted in rapid population growth. Meanwhile, birth rates—and family size—have also been declining as people leave agricultural professions and move to urban areas. This means that population growth rates—while still higher in the developing world than in the developed world—are declining. Although the exact figures are unknown, demographers expect the world's population to stabilize by 2100 and then decline.
The world population increase is particularly pronounced on the continent of Asia, which is home to both China and India. Each with more than a billion people, China and India are the most populous countries in the world. The most striking paradox within-population studies are that while there has been a marked decline in fertility (a declining family size) in developing countries, the world's population will grow by 2030 because of the compounding effect of a substantial number of people already in the world—that is, even though population growth rates are in decline in many countries, the population is still growing. A small growth rate on a large base population still results in the birth of many millions of people.
Social dynamics and geography will determine where the new additions to the human family will live. Providing food, energy, and materials for these additional humans will tax many countries of the world, and poverty, malnutrition, and disease are expected to increase in regions with poor sanitation, limited clean water, and lack of economic resources.
Population growth exacts a toll on the earth as more people use more environmental resources. The areas most immediately affected by increased populations include forests (a fuel resource and a source of building material), freshwater supplies, and agricultural soils. These systems get overtaxed, and their depletion has dire consequences. Type C climates, which are moderate and temperate, are usually the most productive and are already vulnerable to serious deforestation, water pollution, and soil erosion. Maintaining adequate food supplies will be critical to supporting a sustainable carrying capacity. The ability to transport food supplies quickly and safely is a major component of the ability to manage the conservation of resources.
Population Demands
A country's demographic statistics can be illustrated graphically by a population pyramid. A population pyramid is two bar graphs that depict male and female age cohorts either in absolute size or as a percentage of the total population. Male cohorts are typically shown on the left side of the pyramid, and females are on the right side.
The shape of a country's population pyramid tells a story about the history of its population growth. For example, a high-growth-rate country has a pyramid that is narrow at the top and wide at the bottom, showing that every year more children have been born than the year before. As family size decreases and women in society have fewer children, the shape of the pyramid changes. A population pyramid for a post-industrialized country that has negative growth would be narrower at the bottom than in the middle, indicating that there are fewer children than middle-aged people. Four basic shapes indicate the general trends in population growth:
- Rapidly expanding
- Expanding
- Stationery
- Contracting
These shapes also illustrate the percentage of a population under the age of fifteen or over the age of sixty-five, which are standard indicators of population growth. Many postindustrial countries have a negative population growth rate. Their population pyramids are narrow at the bottom, indicating an urbanized population with small family sizes.
China's Response to Population Growth
The government of China has taken the responsibility to address its growing population and the country's ability to provide for the needs of the additional populace. In 1978, China implemented the one-child-only statute, limiting family size to one child. The policy allows for exemptions under certain conditions. Couples living in rural areas and people of minority status are two examples of exempted conditions and may be permitted more than one child, especially if the first child is a girl. Peripheral administrative regions like Macau and Hong Kong are exempt. The one-child-only policy was implemented in an attempt to address environmental, economic, and social issues related to population growth. This policy has helped reduce China's potential population by hundreds of millions of people, but the controversial policy has not been easy to implement or make effective. There are growing concerns regarding the policy's negative impact on society. In response to the one-child-only policy, there have been reports of female infanticide and a higher number of abortions. However, surveys taken by independent agencies indicate that about three-fourths of China's population supports it. Economic incentives pressure families to abide by the one-child-only policy. Government benefits and social programs offer incentives that may be lost if couples have more than one child.
Enforcement of the policy has been left to the provincial authorities with varying levels of success. Parents eager to have a boy to carry on the family name might abort a female baby. Though now illegal, the use of ultrasound equipment to determine the gender of a fetus is widespread. Some provinces in China have a severe shortage of women because of the policy; men in provinces where women are scarce may have to migrate to find a wife. In China, there are more boys born than girls; the ratio averages more than 10 percent more boys than girls, with some provinces reaching more than 25 percent. This imbalance creates cultural issues that may have a negative impact on traditional society. Conventional society is challenged when there are many unmarried young men in an area that may not have adequate employment opportunities for them or available women for potential marriage.
Rural to Urban Shift
More than 50 percent of China's population lives in rural areas, meaning there is potential for important levels of rural-to-urban migration. The core industrial cities located in China Proper attract migrants in a periphery-to-core migration pattern. China hopes that this urbanization and industrial activity will also support its population control methods and fuel the industrial labor base. China's urbanization increased at an unprecedented rate from 17 percent in 1978 to 47 percent in 2010. This rural-to-urban shift has been one of the largest in human history.
Economic Summary
In the past two decades, China has shifted its economy from a closed system with a centrally planned, government-controlled market to one with more open trade and a flexible production structure. These economic reforms have allowed capitalistic tendencies to drive production, have promoted increased involvement in private enterprise, and have increased international investment in the Chinese economy. China has phased out collective farms and has increased agricultural production; the approach to free enterprise and international trade and investment has become more open, and the Chinese economy has grown at a rapid rate. Open trade and interaction with the global community have allowed China to catch up with the rest of the world in terms of information and communication technology. Computer and Internet use in China has opened many sectors to new opportunities and employment possibilities. China's policy of creating special economic zones (SEZs) has increased urban and economic growth in coastal cities, fueling the strong rural-to-urban shift in the population.
The fast-paced growth of the Chinese economy in the past decade has brought with it some negative consequences. The exploitation of resources has resulted in serious soil erosion and air pollution. The water table in many parts of China has decreased because of heavy demands on the nation's water supply. Arable land is being lost to erosion and inadequate land-use practices. Rural areas have not received consideration or resources equal to the coastal cities, so conditions remain poor for most rural people. Half of China's population earns the equivalent of a few dollars per day, while a fortunate few earn high salaries. Unemployment is at an elevated level for tens of millions of migrants who shift from location to location, looking for work.
China's Communist government is controlled by the Chinese Communist Party, which is protected and guaranteed power by the country's constitution. Compared to the more open democratic political systems of Western Europe and North America, China is considered an authoritarian state, complete with heavy restrictions on the Internet, the press, speech, freedom of assembly, reproductive rights, and freedom of religion.
There has been more openness in China's economic reforms and in travel, but other strict rules of the state remain. There is no minimum wage law for factory workers, who work long hours and do not receive benefits or sick leave. There are fewer safety requirements or government regulations for security. China is trying to have the best of both worlds: the efficiency of an authoritarian government and an efficient market-driven capitalist economy. Sustaining the largest standing army in the world, China is geared to become a global superpower. The next great world conflict could be a cultural war between the United States and China that would involve economic, political, and human issues. To work together, the United States and China would be well served to increase their understanding of each other.
Growth of Enterprise and Industry
During the 1980s, following the death of Mao Zedong, China went through a transition period. The new leader, Deng Xiaoping, realized that for China to compete in the world market, its economy would have to be modernized. To attract business and tap into the global market economy, China established SEZs along the coast at strategic port cities. SEZs attracted international corporations who wanted to manufacture goods cheaply, while China's population of 1.3 billion people provided an enormous labor pool and consumer market. China's modernization efforts paid off in the 1990s, when world trade increased and US trade with China exploded.
By the year 2000, China had profited greatly because of its expanded manufacturing capacity. The coastal cities and the SEZs had become core industrial centers, attracting enormous numbers of migrants—most of them poor agricultural workers—looking for work in the factories. Compared to other jobs, factory jobs are prized employment opportunities. Rural-to-urban shift has kicked in and China's urban growth is occurring at unprecedented rates. Chinese people are moving to the cities looking for work, just like people in many other areas of the world. The SEZs encourage multinational corporations to move their overseas operations to China and take advantage of the lower labor and production costs. China benefits from the new business opportunities and the creation of jobs for its citizens. SEZs operate under the objectives of providing tax incentives for foreign companies, exporting market-driven manufactured products, and creating joint partnerships so that everyone benefits. In the past decade, four main cities have been designated as SEZs, along with the entire province of Hainan Island to the south. Many coastal cities were also designated as development areas for industrial expansion. Coastal development and SEZs along the coast of China are prompting the growth of the rural-to-urban shift.
China has a high-level energy demand to fuel its expanding economy and provide for a large population, so alternative energy development has been expanding into the wind and solar power for both domestic and commercial purposes. China's industrial sector is advancing to compete in the global marketplace and muscle into the high-tech economy once dominated by core areas of Japan, Western Europe, and the United States.
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