To be stunned that there were more births in Nigeria in 2024 than the entirety of Europe and Russia combined?

[Eloueesy]

I knew the birth rate was declining in western societies but that figure sounds crazy.

A lot of people don’t realise. Africa as a continent has this incredible youth. I hope they get the chance to fulfil their potential.

The birth rate has completely collapsed in developed countries.

Given the choice, people want smaller families.

Even in countries where they are very supportive (long maternity leave etc) - the birth rate shows no improvement.

The birth rate is declining in Nigeria too but it’s still high enough to be causing a population boom. As long as they continue developing, the birth rate will continue to drop and eventually the population will stabilise. This is the expected trend that developing nations go through.

Source: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.CBRT.IN?end=2023&locations=NG

The main factors are that it's a very young country with an average age of eighteen (compared to near 40 in Europe). Obviously women have far more children on average about 3 to 4.
The whole population in Europe is over 7 million. And in nigeria, it's nearly three million.
Europe stopped having babies a while back. This number is going to go down and down and down. As the next generation is going to have hardly any.
I really hope that the young people in Nigeria are given opportunities to succeed. There is a huge amount of unemployment and poverty. But also lots of good things happening in a vibrant country.

By 2070 Lagos will have a population of over 70 million- why? Oil.

7 million and 3 million??

Population growth slows down in more developed countries. Educating women and supporting them into work reduces. As does preventing child mortality and ensuring the availability of contraception and sex education.

Most of these line up with the development of a country.

Sorry 7 hundred million and 3 hundred million and less we have slipped bacm a few centuries!

Ok, my theory on this is that its all about the money.
I developed countries money flows down the generations so every kid you have costs you a fortune and you get no financial return.
In less developed countries, money flows up the generations. You have loads of kids because they quickly grow up, and start taking on responsibility for bringing money into the family. I think this pressure to financially support their parents is partly what drives immigration to the west.
We're a mercenary lot.

It's not really surprising. White people were a minority globally anyway.

Add into that the crumbling sense of community, the financial strain, long work hours, crippling childcare costs, diabolical healthcare and general sense of doom and I'm not surprised at all.

If families could thrive on one persons wage then that would help tremendously, but that is never going to happen, so decline it is.

It's an uncomfortable truth, but those countries with growing populations tend to have women at home caring for children, and usually very poor access to contraception or reproductive healthcare.

I came across this website - data for each country displayed visually as a pyramid.

https://www.populationpyramids.org/nigeria

"The population [of Nigeria] has grown by 88% since 2000 - adding 111.1 million people in just 24 years"

It’s very concerning.

I imagine over 50% of those women are not birthing children through choice!

I didn't realise until a few years ago just how huge Nigeria is in population terms, and how rapidly it is growing. But I think that was just part of my Eurocentric knowledge base - my general ignorance of African countries.
This makes me feel a little critical of the idea of being 'stunned' by the statistics mentioned in the OP. It isn't really that the statistics are themselves stunning. It is more that we bumble along with a rather parochial and anachronistic outlook that tends to over-perceive the significance of Europe, and of the west.

Sadly that is most likely an underestimate. The social pressure to have lots of children is so strong, and women who are childfree by choice are largely seen as evil or bitter hardcore feminists.

There is the start of a movement though, and there will still be a population decline as the country develops more and women (hopefully) gain more social and reproductive freedom.

minorityafrica.org/i-decided-to-be-free-these-nigerian-women-are-okay-with-being-just-the-cool-aunties/

This is a bit out of date but a good starting point
If anything, the situation has improved since then (ie peak population will be smaller and sooner)

You think the general population of African countries are well versed on population trends in Europe and concern themselves with birth rate trends in the UK? Everyone is parochial. It's not a Western failing.

Why is it concerning? I mean, obviously the increasing global population is concerning, but why should we be concerned by the relative increase in one part of the world compared with another?

It’s not really an uncomfortable truth, it’s just how it is. If you give women no education, no opportunity, no rights, what do you expect.

Nigeria has the highest rate of FGM and marital rape is not recognised as a crime. Women don’t have a choice whether to have babies or not.

Women’s choice over their own bodies is what is slowing down birth rates. In countries with long paid maternity leave, high wages, great healthcare, etc., women are still having fewer babies. I know many families who can survive on one person’s salary who have decided not to have children, or just one.

It is a huge country with a large population, and birth rates are slumping in Europe.

Good luck to them - let’s hope all that youth and potential can do great things.

Why do you imagine that I think Europeans are more parochial in their outlook than others? I agree that everyone is prone to overperceive what is local to them.

Exactly, those stats are horrifying in the way the stats for our Victorian ancestors were horrifying, loads and loads of kids.

Exactly, the biggest uncomfortable truth for society is that given the choice, women dont necessarily want children. Its not necessarily to do with wider society and the social system they're in either, not everyone wants the physical and mental drain of being a parent.

Men have been more overt about this since day dot, but women are now able to say the same.

And yet they will consume far fewer resources per person and create less polution thsn the average child in the West.

Infanticide is also really high. There was an article yesterday about how if a baby's mum dies in chilbirth then the baby will often be poisoned or buried alive with it as it's seen as cursed or evil. Ditto for babies with a disability and sometimes twins and triplets too. It's illegal but a huge problem.