From overpopulation to depopulation: the Philippines a century hence

 (Published in ENRICH magazine, 2023)

THE WORLD'S EIGHTH BILLIONTH person was born in the Philippines on November 15, 2022. This symbolic milestone was announced to Filipinos by the Commission on Population and Development (PopCom).

PopCom said the eighth billionth person is a girl, Vinice Mabansag, of Tondo, Manila. The agency gifted the mother and child with a “welcome cake” to mark the historic occasion.

"The world has reached another population milestone after a baby girl born in Tondo, Manila was chosen to symbolically mark the eighth billionth person in the world," said PopCom in a Facebook post. "Baby Vinice was welcomed on Nov. 15 by nurses at Dr. Jose Fabella Memorial Hospital, as well as representatives from the Commission on Population and Development".

United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres described the event as an "occasion to celebrate diversity and advancements while considering humanity's shared responsibility for the planet". In a statement, the UN said the steady growth in the global population is due to higher fertility rates, especially in the world's poorest countries (many of which are in Africa), and to people living longer thanks to advances in medicine, public health, nutrition and personal hygiene.

New born baby Vinice Mabansag, the world's eighth billionth person

Good news?

This landmark event, however, might herald an end to the pronatalism and its focus of child-bearing and parenthood that has been a hallmark of Philippine society since the end of the Second World War.

A relentless drop in fertility since 1946 means the Philippines will eventually come to grips with the perils of depopulation or population collapse. Depopulation has the power to make the Philippines old before it can even become rich. It might also put paid to the Philippines' cherished dream of becoming a First World country.

When a country's total fertility rate (TFR or births per woman) persistently falls below the replacement fertility level of 2.1 children per woman, its population grows older and shrinks. This outcome can slow economic growth and endanger pensions for the elderly.

Depopulation will also trigger slower growth in living standards, argues Prof. Charles Jones in a new study, “The End of Economic Growth?”, published in 2020.

He contends depopulation will give rise to a vicious cycle in which low fertility in one generation causes low fertility in the next. The end result will be a downward spiral in population. This scenario had earlier been given the name, the “Low-Fertility Trap Hypothesis”, by demographer Wolfgang Lutz and colleagues in a paper published in 2006.

Lower birth rates will also result in a smaller pool of young people entering the labor force. Coupled with an ageing population, the dearth of young people will strain a country's economic resources and might see a decline in growth. Rapid population ageing is a consequence of low fertility.

Japan’s labor force, for example, will drop from 68 million to 46 million (a 32% decline) by 2050 if present demographic trends continue. Germany will see a plunge from 41 million to 28 million.

China, however, is the poster boy for the crippling dangers of negative long-term population decline. Its population (now at 1.412 billion persons) is forecast to shrink to 1.411 billion by 2023, according to Statista. This drop is the offshoot of China's disastrous One Child Policy implemented in 1980 when its TFR stood at 3.01 births per woman. The One Child Policy triggered a precipitous fall in China's fertility rate to 1.15 births per woman by 2021.

China, the world's most populous country, is now facing a population collapse that will write finis to its grand ambition of becoming the world's leading economic and military power by the 2040s. Also as a result, China might never become a First World country.

Early demographic data suggests an absolute decline in China's population in 2022 -- the first reduction in 60 years. China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said the country's population grew by a puny 480,000 people in 2021, a record low increase that brought its population to 1.412 billion. In contrast, China's annual population growth stood at around eight million only a decade ago.

By 2050, China's population will decrease to 1.317 billion from today's 1.412 billion. This loss of some 100 million Chinese is depopulation on a massive scale and one from which China might never recover. On the other hand, India should have a population of 1.668 billion by 2050. It is widely expected to become the world's most populous country in 2023.

China population pyramid 2020

Becoming China

The Philippines is now faced with the potentially crippling phenomena where low fertility and a low birth rate reminiscent to that of China's become major barriers to economic prosperity.

The Philippines’ fertility rate in 2022 dropped to 1.9 children per woman between 15 and 49 years-old compared to 2.7 in 2017, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) in November. That’s below the replacement level of 2.1 offspring per woman, which is the point at which a population replaces itself from one generation to the next.

It's the first time the country's fertility rate has fallen below the replacement level of 2.1 based on government data. The Philippines' fertility rate stood at 7.5 births per woman in 1950, falling by half to 3.8 by the year 2000. It has consistently decreased every year from 1950 to 2021.

The country’s birth rate is also on the decline. It fell to 19.778 births per 1,000 individuals in 2022, a 1% drop from 19.978 births per 1,000 people in 2021, said the PSA. The 2021 birth rate for Philippines was 0.99% lower than that for 2020 with its 20.177 births per 1,000 people. The 2020 birth rate was 0.98% smaller than that for 2019.

In comparison, China's birth rate plummeted to a record low of 7.52 per 1,000 people in 2021 compared to 8.52 in 2020, said the NBS. It’s been decreasing since 2017.

The birth rate and fertility rate are two different measures. The former refers to the total number of annual births per 1,000 individuals. On the other hand, the fertility rate counts the total number of births in a year per 1,000 women of reproductive age in a population.

Birth rates ranging from 10 to 20 births per 1,000 are considered low, and the Philippines now fits into this category. Rates from 40 to 50 births per 1,000 are considered high.

Steep fertility drop

The unexpectedly large drop in fertility is “the sharpest ever recorded,” said PopCom Executive Director Lolito Tacardon in November. Tacardon also said the reasons for the decline include easier access to family planning and birth control and a desire among half of currently married Filipinas to no longer bear more children.

Tacardon said the steep drop in fertility also means the Philippines now has the third lowest fertility rate in Southeast Asia after Singapore (1.1 children per woman) and Thailand (1.5). He noted the average Asian fertility rate is 2.2.

He claimed there are “more pros than cons” to the Philippines falling below the replacement fertility level. He saw the decrease as a "demographic transition" giving the country an opportunity to “hasten socioeconomic development”.

The country's population grew by a scant 900,000 persons in 2020 and 324,000 in 2021 compared to 1.5 million in 2019, the year before the advent of COVID-19 pandemic. The birth rate in 2021 was the smallest annual natural increase since 1946 when the country's total population grew by only 254,000 persons.

The government, however, is showing no alarm at these changes. It said the low population growth in 2020 and 2021 gives the country a greater chance to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic. PopCom Executive Director Dr. Juan Perez III said this might also improve the services provided by the national and local governments.

“Filipinos remained prudent by continuing to delay having children or forming families during the combined economic crisis and Covid-19 health emergency," said Perez in December 2021. "Couples in growing numbers continue to avail of family planning commodities and services in all regions of the country, with eight million users of modern family planning methods in 2020, or an addition of about 500,000 from 2019".

PopCom in August 2022 revealed the country's population of children had fallen over the last two decades due to "lower levels of fertility". The Philippines is also seeing a lower percentage of younger people in its total population of 110 million.

PopCom said the population of Filipino children below 5 years-old had dipped to 10.2% in 2020 from 10.8% in 2015 and 12.6% in 2000, based on data from the PSA. The percentage of Filipinos below 15 also decreased, from 37% in 2000 to 30.7% in 2020.

Perez attributed the lower number of children born since 2015 to "the effectiveness of the Philippines’ family planning program".

He said this trend should be considered good news given the Philippines' persistent overpopulation problem. He argued there was “nothing wrong with the low birth rate” in 2020 and 2021 and described these outcomes as a welcome demographic transition.

“There were fewer births because avoidance of pregnancy, unplanned pregnancies, unintended pregnancies were the aim of most women, and the economic crisis as well is (showing) that whenever there is an economic downturn, births go down,” said Perez.

Based on the latest data, PopCom estimated the Philippine population at 109,991,095 for 2021. This new estimate is two million persons lower than earlier projections and is based on a 1.63% population growth rate.

“If integrated population and development measures are sustained, we can look forward to a more stable population that can effectively support Philippine development," noted Perez. "Smaller family sizes need to be supported by a national living wage structure that also allows parents to save for their households’ unmet needs in food, housing, and education".

Philippine population pyramid 2020

Rapid depopulation

The biggest downside to low fertility's is it reduces a country's population only among the young and not among other age groups. Persistent low fertility also creates the conditions for future population decline. Overpopulation will no longer be a problem for the Philippines.

Demographers say a slide in fertility must be halted if a population is to be demographically sustainable. Depopulation is a situation the Philippines might face if it's not careful and if fertility continues to decrease year after year.

It's been seen that countries suffering from low fertility can experience depopulation at an extremely fast rate. The example of South Korea is a dire warning to our country.

South Korea in 2021 reported the world lowest fertility rate of only 0.81 births per woman compared to the global average of 2.32. If this chronically low fertility rate continues, South Korea will see its current population of 52 million persons plunge to only 38 million by 2070, according to Statistics Korea. That's an almost 40% drop in a mere 50 years. The last time South Korea had a 38 million population was in 1980/81.

Japan is also in the same boat at South Korea as one of the few Asian countries experiencing depopulation. Its population is forecast to decrease from 126.5 million in 2020 to 105.8 million in 2050. This is a 16.3% population reduction. Japan's population is shrinking rapidly and the main reason is its low fertility rate, which stood at 1.37 births per woman in 2021. That same year saw only 811,604 babies born, the lowest number since Japan began keeping records in 1899.

By 2050, populations will decrease in more than half the European countries. Interestingly, some 60% of the global population resides in countries like ours where fertility rates have dropped below the replacement level of 2.1 births per woman.

One more chance

It’s  odd that despite the Philippines ’ low  fertility rate of 1.9 children per woman, our country was still listed by the United Nations in its World Population Prospects 2022 as among the eight countries that will account for more than half of the projected increase in global population up to 2050.

The estimated Philippine population in 2050 will be 157.9 billion compared to today's 110 million, or an increase of 48 million Filipinos over the next three decades. This seems to explain why the UN included the Philippines among the top eight countries driving global population growth by 2050. Compare to this to Japan whose population will shrink by more than 20 million in 2050 from today's 126.5 million.

Our population will peak at 180.8 billion in 2090 before decreasing in the succeeding years to 180.1 million by the year 2100, according to the UN. The new UN estimates are significantly higher than those projected by the 2019 edition of its World Population Prospects.

The other seven countries that will drive global population growth in 2050 are the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria, Pakistan and Tanzania. The report also estimated the global population at 8.5 billion in 2030, 9.7 billion in 2050 and 10.4 billion in 2100.

The UN report also said the rate of new people being born around the world is definitely slowing down. The global population, however, is expected to continue increasing for many more decades. Population changes gradually over time, so countries like the Philippines facing future depopulation should have enough time to reverse course -- if they want to.

Demographers say the longer a low fertility rate persists; the harder it becomes to reverse depopulation. Countries wanting to avoid depopulation have to make higher levels of fertility a priority national goal while their demographics still allow for population growth.

The Philippines has an easy choice to make given it has the rest of this century to act. But can it be trusted to make the right decision?

Philippine median age 2020