CGD Policy Blogs

Population and development in Western Africa are closely linked. At the heart of these issues lies the slow demographic transition of the region’s countries, which still experience some of the highest fertility rates in the world.

Last month the Center for Global Development hosted a meeting on the Role of Population and Development Research in Western Africa at our offices in Washington DC.   Over the daylong workshop, 17 participants with a diverse range of expertise and perspectives discussed the many pressing population and development issues in that part of the world. Participants came from organizations including USAID, the World Bank, IPAS, UC Berkeley, UNPFA, PRB, the Hewlett Foundation, and Cornell University. In their discussions, the group agreed that there remains a lack of clear policy recommendations or consensus on how to best address the population and development nexus, despite a renewed focus on the role of family planning, reproductive health, and demography as essential drivers of economic development.   In addition, a few common themes emerged and participants identified several research questions that will require closer attention over the coming years.

Between 1970 and 2010, most emerging countries achieved impressive gains in contraceptive coverage. As a result, their fertility has declined, their population growth rate has slowed down, and many of these countries have been able to capture the economic benefits of the demographic dividend, which occurs when the labor force becomes relatively larger in the total population thanks to lower fertility levels. In addition, the fertility decline improves the dependency ratios and reduces the burden of youth on working adults.

This Wonkcast was originally recorded in February 2011. Andy Sumner updates the data from the original Bottom Billion brief in his recent working paper, Where Will the World's Poor Live? An Update on Global Poverty and the New Bottom Billion.

Paul Collier’s 2007 book, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What Can Be Done About It, changed the way we think about poverty and development. Collier argued that the majority of the 5-billion people in the "developing world" live in countries with sustained high growth rates and would eventually escape from poverty. The rest—the bottom billion—live in 58 small, poor, often land-locked countries that are growing very slowly or not at all. These countries, stuck in poverty traps, should be the focus of foreign aid, Collier argued.

Despite major fertility declines that have taken place in recent decades almost all over the world, population growth is far from over. As Ken Weiss points out in a recent five-part series in the Los Angeles Times, the adverse effects of population growth are well documented and wide ranging. But population reduction through fertility declines may also have unintended consequences if proper policies aren’t in place early on.