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• Population is influenced by birth rates and death rates.
• Population changes can be shown on a Demographic Transition Model (DTM).
• There are different ways of managing population such as encouraging people to have more or fewer children or limiting birth rates by law.

Play a Planet Planners mission and help a country to prepare for the effects of an ageing population.

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The population of a country changes over time. These changes are caused by three factors - births, deaths and migration.The change in population caused by births and deaths is called natural change. The population will get larger or smaller depending on birth rates and death rates. If the birth rate is higher than the death rate there will be a natural increase. If the death rate is higher than the birth rate there will be a natural decrease.

Population is also affected by migration. Migration includes both immigration, when people move to a country, and emigration, when people move away from a country.

Changes in population are usually closely linked to the development of a country and can be illustrated by the Demographic Transition Model (DTM). The DTM shows the relationship between birth rates and death rates and population, but not migration.

The DTM can be split into five stages:

Stage one – Population is low but there are high birth and death rates.

Stage two – Population begins to increase as death rates fall due to improvements in medicine and sanitation. Birth rates remain high.

Stage three – Population is still increasing but more slowly now as birth rates fall due to increased access to contraception and familyplanning, improvements in health education and a general desire for smaller families. Death rate continues to fall but at a slower rate than at stage two.

Stage four – Population is now high but as birth rates and death rates are now low, the rate of population change is steadier than before.

Stage five – Population may start to decline at this point due to low birth rates and an ageing population leading to a slight increase in death rates.

Learn more about the different stages of the Demographic Transition Model with this activity.

When looking at population, structure as well as total numbers is important. This means looking at the number of people in each age group and how those numbers are changing. These are known as population pyramids. Countries at different stages of the DTM have different shaped population pyramids.

The interpretation of a population pyramid can help a geographer understand the structure of a country, for example:

• a wide base to the pyramid indicates a young population
• wider bars at the top of the pyramid indicate an ageing population

There may be anomalies in the pyramid, for example:

• a longer than expected bar may indicate a large amount of immigration at that age range
• a shorter than expected bar may be due to war or famine

Governments sometimes create policies to manage their population. They may try to increase birth rates, and therefore the population, by encouraging people to have children through pro-natal policies. Alternatively, they may try to decrease the birth rate, and slow the rate of population growth, by discouraging people from having children through anti-natal policies.

Pro-natal strategies are used in the United Kingdom to try and boost fertility rates. These include incentives such as child benefit payments, free childcare, and improved maternity and paternity leave. There are also family-friendly employment laws such as the right to request flexible hours and job sharing.

In the 1970s, China attempted to reduce the country's birth rate and slow the population growth by introducing the one-child policy whereby families could only have one child. The policy did slow population growth but also had some negative impacts. The policy led to a decrease in human rights because people were not allowed to make decisions about the size of their families. China now has an ageing population which threatens to slow economic growth as the number of working-age people decreases. China has made some changes to their policy and, as of 2021, families are now allowed to have three children.

The state of Kerala in India also faced high population growth. This was creating many problems, such as overcrowding and a shortage of food. The government have now slowed this population growth through a mixture of contraception use and the introduction of government policies to improve education and healthcare, especially for women. Improvements in education have also led to infant mortality rates falling. This has meant that Kerala has managed to control its population growth without restrictions on family size.