SUMMARY

Three essential processes, namely fertility, mortality, and migration, define the pattern of population growth.

According to the demographic transitional model:

In the first stage:

• Countries normally exhibit a population growth with a high level of fertility and mortality.

In the second stage:

• Death

The third stage

•  Marked by a decrease in the birth rate, owing mostly to socioeconomic changes, urbanization, and widespread contraception use.

In the fourth stage

• Birth rates fall to levels where they are equal to death rates, resulting in a slowly growing population.

In the fifth stage:

•  The birth rate rose again but the death rate remained low bringing stable or low population growth.

Fertility remained above the global average in 2019, primarily in Sub-Saharan Africa (4.6),

African LDCs had the highest population growth rate of 2.8 % per year between 1970 and 2012

• MDCs’ population growth rates are lower than those of LDCs.