Countries with high fertility more than 1

The extreme right very dangerously blind Europeans on African immigration. By pretending the problem by the rejection in the sea of boat people and the closure of borders, elle aggravates it erroneously believing able stop the daunting forces of demographic tectonics at work.

The United Nations has just published an upward revision of its projections on the evolution of the world's population on the 2100 horizon. We are 7 billion earthlings, we'll be 9.3 billion in 2050 (over 150 million from the previous projections) and 10.1 billion at the end of century (more 1 billion). The new calculations are based on fertility, very difficult to predict but determinative factor. A small variation causes considerable movements: a lower fertility of 0.5 children per woman from the average trend would lead to a global population of 6.2 billion in 2100 and a superior fertility of 0.5 child 15.8 billion.

If it remains on the median scenario, we learn that the number of children per woman in countries with low fertility (the United States, Europe, the Russia China and the Brazil) is expected to grow from 1.6 to 1.8 by 2050 and 2100 2. But this level will remain below the replacement level and therefore the populations of these countries will decrease by 20 during the 21st century, from 2.9 to 2.4 billion. Countries with high fertility (more than 1.5 daughter by women, so that the mother would have at least a girl up to the age of reproduction) will see their population triple and move from 1.2 to 4.2 billion. But 39 of the 55 countries are in Africa.

Demographic tectonics draws a Europe aging and declining in part, separated by the Mediterranean Sea from Africa become demographic bomb: 416 million in 1975, 1 billion today, 2.2 billion in 2050. The output of the last war, Europe was three times more populous than Africa, the report will be reversed in 2050.

The African population explosion - the fastest ever observed in the history - intervenes in a continent that combines the disadvantages: poverty, lack of water, agriculture pre-modern, poor democratic score. The debates on the birth control, excluded in the 1970s, could revive in these countries, as noted by Pierre Buhler (1), both problems are heavy: how to manage a Tanzania, for example, happening of 45 million people today to 138 million in 40 years Young people (40 of Africans have less than 15 years) represent a positive potential as well as an enormous challenge.

Before this inevitable, Europe should postpone all other cases, to develop a comprehensive African policy. A global imbalance and to such scale is unprecedented between, on the one hand, countries explosive demographics but the economy and the policy failed, and the other countries, on the other hand, with an advanced economy and a strong democracy, but insufficient population. The figures of the United Nations emphasize the urgency of a new Euro-African dialogue on the economy, energy, agriculture and migration.

Unfortunately, immigration mobilizes only minds and block debate in protectionism. Africa is at a few tens of kilometres. The European Union has absorbed 26 million migrants but the public opinion became hostile: the integration of the second generation of immigrants goes wrong, the labour market is under pressure, generosity is limited by the deficits of the social organizations. Europe sharpens this hostility because it has attracted a few skilled immigration (only 5) when the United States have been able to receive 55 of the educated world emigrants. A recent developments but opens up favourable prospects: for the first time last year, half of global immigrants were women (51 in Europe). The change could be smiling: as workers in the 1950s, these women correspond to the current needs of the economies of developed countries services (child care, health...).

But be limited to only one chapter of the migration will not be enough to defuse the African bomb. The Tunisian and Egyptian spring, and the price of raw materials, which boosts the African economy, needed to renew the look.