Geography Unit 1

1.1 Population and economic development

  • How does population vary between places?

Physical factors that affect human population distribution

  • Determine where people can actually live
    -Direct and Indirect


  • weather/ climate
  • relief, altitude and latitude
  • water supply
  • natural resource supply
  • soils

Human factors affecting population distribution

  • Employment opportunities
    -As a country becomes more developed, jobs will shift to more tertiary than primary

  • Communication and accessibility
    -Coastal areas with export and import opportunities
    -Flat coastal areas for easy construction


  • Government Policy
    -Forced relocation
  • Wars

Classification of economic development

  • High income country (per capita income over 12,735)
  • Middle income country ( between)
  • Low income country (less than 1,026)
  • One third of global GDP is produced by MICs


  • Less and less people are living in LICs as the world overall becomes more developed

Population distribution and economic development on a national scale

  • People migrate for social and economic reasons
  • Migration increases the disparity of the core-periphery model
    -Core: more developed, high literacy rates, wide raneg or services and good housing
    -Periphery: Less developed, resources given to core, insufficient services, large population growth

Ways of measuring economic development

  • Economic development: The transition of a country relying mostly on primary industries to then secondary and tertiary through the introduction of new technology resulting in an increased wealth and improved standard of living
  • Economic indicatiors
    -GNI per capita (gross national income/ mid year population + income and payments from abroad)
    -GDP per capita (total value of goods and services produced within a country in a given timepoint)
    -Power Purchasing Parity: accounts for the cost of living day to day
  • These only account for the formal economy and average it

China case study
-Much of the land is unusable due to mountains and infertile soil
-Most population is located SE where megacities are by the coast
-160 million migrants left rural to join core
-Wages in urban areas are 40% higher than rural
-The large migration causes the rural-urban inequalities to widen

Synthesis
Although physical factors were originally important, human factors are more important now as more places become developed and have a need for communication and jobs

1.2 Changing population and places

  • What are the processes of population change and their effect of people and places?

Population change and demographic transition over time

Population change is due to the birth rate, death rate and migration

  • Most population growth is expected to happen in Africa

Stage one of DMT

High and variable

Birth + death rates are high

  • want children for work
  • Low standard of living

Population growth fluctuates

Only some indigenous tribes are still at this stage

Stage two DMT

Early Expanding

Birth rates remain high, death rates come down

Rapid population growth

Stage three DMT

Stage four DMT

Late expanding

Birth rate drops

Death rate remains low

Population growth at smaller rate

Low and variable

Birth and death rates are low

Population growth fluctuates

Most developed countries are at this stage

Stage five DMT

Low declining

Birth rate lower than death rate

  • Children are very costly
  • People need less children

Population declines

Much higher SOL

The UN population growth predictions

  • Changed estimate from 9 billion between 2050 and 2100 to 11.6 billion by 2100
  • Some believe these predictions to be inaccurate as you can never know if projections of certain countries will actually occur
  • Some fertility projections are intentionally high
  • The projections do not account for education
  • population momentum

Total fertility rate

  • Average number of births per 100 women of childbearing age

Status of women

  • Where female education is low, birthrates are high
  • More employment = less children

Level of education and material ambition

  • More educated parents = fewer children
  • Wish to improve standard of living before having more children

Location of residence

  • more social pressure to have women in rural areas
  • Fewer education opportunities for women in rural

Religion and social pressure

Economic prosperity

  • If children cost more, less likely to have them

Life expectancy at birth

  • Life expectancy increases as countries develop due to better SOL
  • Although LE increases, the years spent may be in poor health

Dependency ratios

  • pop 15< + pop >64 / pop 15-64 x 100
  • Sometimes people in working age are not actually working
  • Assumes that people below 15 and over 64 dont work
    • The lower the ratio, the better it is (less support)

Megacities and consequences of their growth

  • Metropolitan area with an excess of 10 million people
  • Megacities occur due to people in rural areas seeking better job opportunities or cities becoming hubs for migrants
  • the economy shifting from periphery to core

Consequences of megacity growth

Rapid growth leads to less capability to keep up with infrastructure demands (public transport, roads, housing)

Large consumption of natural resources

Lack of housing and development of slums

Large amounts of pollution

Positive impacts of Megacity growth

Increased GDP for the area and improve SOL

Migration

  • The movement of people from one place to another

Causes of forced migration

Conflict induced displacement

  • Forced to leave due to civil wars or racism
  • in 2015 there were 15 million refugees

Development-Induced Displacement

  • People forced to move due to the construction of dams and highways
  • 10 million people displaced due to dams

Disaster-Induced Displacement

  • Natural disasters resulting in loss of housing

Consequences of migration

At destination

  • Impact on job availability
  • Pressure on public services
  • Social and political tensions
  • Higher crime rates
  • More disease

On Migrant

  • Loss of friends and family
  • Malnutrition and constantly job seeking
  • Unstable income at first

Arrival of young people can increase development and workforce
May attract external aid

1.3 Challenges and opportunities

  • What are the population possibilities and who holds the power to make these decisions

Average family size

Replacement fertility rates
Net reproduction rate

Why do people choose to have less children?

What societal values have changed the fertility rates?


  • The status of women has changed and it is now more acceptable for women to work and delay childbearing


  • Societal values have changed and it is now more acceptable for couples to have one or no children

What are the negatives and positives of having a smaller family?

Sex Ratio

North Africa and the Middle east have a sex ratio of over 1 (more males than females)

What factors have affected the sex ratio?

Ageing population

What are the causes for an ageing population?


  • Better health care and housing leading to longer life expectancy


  • Declining fertility rate

What are the benefits for an ageing population?

What are the disadvantages of an ageing population?

Japan has 10% more elderly than other HIC

How do you combat an ageing population?

  • Increasing retirement age
  • Increase income tax to pay pensions
  • Obligatory private pensions
  • Pro natalist policies
  • Changing immigration laws
  • They hold cultural values
  • They support the leisure and retirement industry
  • Crime rates lower
  • Grandparents can take care of children so that parents can work
  • More dependent on workers
  • More health care costs
  • Older people in workforce decrease development
  • Sex-selective abortions (China)
  • Male babies have higher mortality than female
  • Couples may keep on having girls until they can have a boy
  • Discrimination against girls in LICs
  • Some migrant are only allowed to be male in order to work

Pro-natalist policies

What are the incentives given by governments for pro-natalist policies?

  • Free public transport for children
  • Paid maternity and paternity leave (sweden 16 months)
  • Government subsidies for child care
  • Advertising (have three or more if you can afford it. Singapore 1987)
  • Income tax reduction

Anti- natalist policies

What are the incentives given by the government for anti-natalist policies?

  • Tax disincentives (in china, increasing tax per child)
  • Raising awareness (educating the population)
  • Provision of family planning services
  • Given women rights and freedom (emancipation)

Human trafficking

Demographic dividend