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World in the Balance Student Handout Double Up "At first there is only one lily pad in the pond, but the next day it doubles, and thereafter each of its descendants doubles. The pond completely fills up with lily pads in 30 days. When is the pond exactly half full? Answer: on the 29th day."—Old French riddle Unlike the lily pads in the French riddle, the human population does not double in size every day. However, it is increasing more quickly than you might suspect. In this activity, you will have the chance to investigate how quickly the populations in different countries are increasing. Procedure Your team will be assigned six to eight countries. Find each country's 10-year growth rates on the "Growth Rates Worldwide" handout. (The 10-year growth rate tells you the rate at which the population of the country increases every 10 years.) Based on each country's growth rate, make a prediction as to how many decades (10-year periods) it might take for each country's population to double in size. Record your predictions on a separate sheet of paper. Use an initial population of 50 individuals for each country. Follow the steps listed on your "Calculating Population Growth" handout to calculate how large each country's population will be after 10 years. Record the new population size on a separate sheet of paper. Repeat the process until each country's population size doubles. Use your results to make a graph that shows how the population for each country increases over 10-year periods. Graph the number of years on the x-axis and the number of people on the y-axis. Draw the best-fit curve. Questions Write your answers on a separate sheet of paper. Compare your results with your original predictions. How do they compare? Compare your results with those of other teams. How does increasing or decreasing the growth rate affect how quickly the population size increases or decreases? Use your "Growth Rates Worldwide" handouts to find the country or territory with the lowest growth rate and the country or territory with the highest growth rate. Use your formula to calculate how long it would take each one to double. How do they compare to the countries in your original data set? If you were a leader of either of those countries, what would be your concerns about your country's growth rate? The world population is currently estimated at roughly six billion people. If the projected 10-year growth rate is 0.123, how long will it take for the world population to double? ===================== Global Trends Quiz World in the Balance homepage Populations in both rich and poor nations are on a course to change dramatically in the coming decades. These changes could radically impact economies as well as have enormous consequences for local and global environments. In the following quiz, explore what may lie ahead. Definition of Regions Throughout the quiz, "more developed" and "developed" refer to all of Europe and North America, plus Australia, Japan, and New Zealand. "Less developed" and "developing" refer to all other regions and countries. This classification system is used by the United Nations. Population Trends In the Developed World (7 questions) 1. At "replacement-level fertility," the average couple has only enough children to replace itself, or about two children. Which developed countries have above replacement-level fertility? Italy & France United States none 2. Where is a woman's life expectancy the highest in the world? Japan Kenya United States 3. How many people living in the developed world are 60 years or older? 1 out of 10 1 out of 5 1 out of 3 4. While many Americans aged 65 and older live with spouses, what percentage live with grown children or other extended-family members? 15 percent 20 percent 70 percent 5. By 2035, how many working-age adults (15-64) will there be to support each elder (65 and over) in the developed world? 2.5 4.7 7.4 6. In 1995 the payroll tax rate in the U.S. was 15.8 percent. According to economist Peter Peterson, what would the payroll tax rate need to be in 2030 to cover current retirement promises? 31.9 percent 53.2 percent 71.5 percent 7. What percentage of people living in the U.S. were born in other nations? 2.5 percent 11 percent 14 percent Population Trends In the Developing World (8 questions) 1. To project future populations, the United Nations Population Division (UNPD) makes assumptions about fertility rates. If today's rates do not change, what will the population of developing nations be in 2050? 7.7 billion 9.3 billion 11.6 billion 2. For a baby born in India in 1881, life expectancy was a mere 25 years. What is it today? 48 years 60 years 63 years 3. How has the fertility rate, or average number of children per woman, changed in the past 50 years in the less developed world, excluding China? increased from 7.7 to 8.0 plummeted from 6.1 to 3.3 decreased from 6.1 to 5.2 4. What is the link between women's education and family size? Educated women have smaller families. no link Educated women have larger families. 5. What percentage of married women in India use contraception to limit family size? less than 10 percent 48 percent 70 percent 6. How many women in the developing world died in 2000 of causes related to pregnancy and childbirth? 136,000 253,000 527,000 7. How many young people between the ages of 0 and 14 are there in the developing world? 200 million 550 million 1.6 billion 8. What percent of people in the developing world live in urban settings? 14 percent 40 percent 76 percent The Environmental Challenge (9 questions) 1. Most environmental damage caused by people in the developed world is attributable to: automobiles industrial pollutants high consumption patterns 2. North Americans consume how much more energy per person than Africans? 2 times as much 8 times as much 15 times as much 3. How many cars are there in China for every thousand people? 15 cars 200 cars 600 cars 4. While wealth and related high levels of consumption can lead to environmental damage, so too can poverty. Poor rural families are more likely, for example, to engage in slash-and-burn agriculture and pollute local water resources. What percent of the world's people lives on less than US$1 a day? 23 percent 70 percent 82 percent 5. Earth's freshwater resources are finite. If current consumption rates remain the same, what percent of annual available freshwater will the world's population use in 2025? 54 percent 70 percent 90 percent 6. How many people in the world today are chronically undernourished? 34 million 300 million 826 million 7. At the end of the 20th century, the average population density around the world was 45 people per sq. km. What was it in Bangladesh? 180 958 6,499 8. In the 1950's economist Simon Kuznets charted the relationship between industrialization and pollution. He found that as nations industrialize, pollution levels: rise steadily initially rise, then peak and decline rise slowly, then increase dramatically 9. "Carrying capacity" is the maximum number of animals of a species that a habitat can support indefinitely. What is Earth's carrying capacity for humans? 13.4 billion 33 billion It may be impossible to calculate. Answers Note on Sources NOVA | World in the Balance | PBS Visit the companion Web site to the NOVA program World in the Balance, about global population and consumption patterns in both rich and poor countries, ... www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/worldbalance/ - Cached - Similar Global Trends Quiz Material World Human Numbers Through Time Population Campaigns TV Program Description Be a Demographer Earth in Peril Producers' Stories More results from pbs.org »