Indian Census Count Totals 1.21 billion

The provisional results of the 2011 Census of India have just been released, and they show that the population has now reached 1.21 billion. BBC News notes that:

More people now live in India than in the United States, Indonesia, Brazil, Pakistan and Bangladesh combined.
India launched the 2011 census last year. The exercise costs in the region of 22bn rupees ($490m; £300m). Some 2.7 million officials visited households in about 7,000 towns and 600,000 villages, classifying the population according to gender, religion, education and occupation.

Korean Immigrants Successful in the US

The US Census figures have emphasized the recent growth of the Latino population, while also noting that the Asian population has been increasing almost as quickly, although there are still considerably fewer Asians than Hispanics in the US. BBC News has a story about the rather amazing success of the Korean immigrant population, fueled by classic patterns of chain migration, a strong sense of community, and hard work.

Like other immigrants before them, Koreans supported each other, often pooling money to provide no interest loans to help the newest immigrants start their businesses.

John Kim, of the Korean Produce Association in New York, whose parents immigrated and opened a sweet shop when he was a boy, recounts a common adage describing how important it was for new immigrants to know someone before arriving in a new country.

"As a new immigrant, the saying goes, 'Whoever picks you up form the airport, whatever business they are in is what you will go into'."

Like other immigrants before them, Koreans supported each other, often pooling money to provide no interest loans to help the newest immigrants start their businesses.

Russian Census Results Confirm Population Decline

Results of the 2010 Census of the Russian Federation have just been released and, according to the report from the New York Times, they confirm that the population of Russia is in decline.

A census carried out in October 2010 showed that the population had fallen to 142.9 million, from 145.2 million in 2002, when the previous census was taken, and from 146.3 million in 2001, according to Russia’s Federal Statistics Service. Russia is expected to lose an estimated one million workers every year until 2017.

Non-Hispanic Whites Are Now a Minority in the New York Area

The recently released results of the US 2010 Census highlighted the growth nationally of the Hispanic and Asian populations.

More than half of the growth in the total U.S. population between 2000 and 2010 was because of the increase in the Hispanic population. Between 2000 and 2010, the Hispanic population grew by 43 percent, rising from 35.3 million in 2000 to 50.5 million in 2010. The rise in the Hispanic population accounted for more than half of the 27.3 million increase in the total U.S. population. By 2010, Hispanics comprised 16 percent of the total U.S. population of 308.7 million.

The non-Hispanic population grew relatively slower over the decade at about 5 percent. Within the non-Hispanic population, the number of people who reported their race as white alone grew even slower (1 percent). While the non-Hispanic white alone population increased numerically from 194.6 million to 196.8 million over the 10-year period, its proportion of the total population declined from 69 percent to 64 percent.

The 23 county area around New York City became the first region outside of the West or South to transition to a situation where non-Hispanic whites have become the minority.

In 2000, the census found that non-Hispanic whites made up 54.3 percent of the area’s population. By 2010, their share had declined to 49.6 percent.

Plato, Missouri is the New Population Center of the US

Now that the Census Bureau has released all of the redistricting data from the 2010 Census, we know that the population center of the country has continued its movement to the west and south, now centered on the tiny town of Plato, Missouri. It has been moving measurably west ever since the second census in 1800 and its shift to west by southwest has been in play since the beginning of the twentieth century. The center has been in Missouri since 1980 and, at its current pace, will probably still be in Missouri after the 2020 census.

Based on current U.S. growth, which is occurring mostly in the South and West, the population center is expected to cross into Arkansas or Oklahoma by the middle of this century.

The last time the U.S. center fell outside the Midwest was 1850, in the eastern territory now known as West Virginia. Its later move to the Midwest bolstered the region as the nation's heartland in the 20th century, central to farming and manufacturing.

Côte d'Ivoire Mess Creating a Million Refugees

Reports out of western Africa suggest that a million people (out of a country population of about 22 million) may have fled Côte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) in anticipation of a full-scale civil war over the issue of presidential succession. Ironically, this election was supposed to have solidified the country, which has been divided since the end of a previous civil war in 2002. Alassne Quattara is generally acknowledged to have won last year's election, but Laurent Gbagbo has refused to step down from the presidency, creating a genuine mess.

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Guiglo is in a lawless zone, there is no functioning police, everyone does what they want”

Jacques FranquinUNHCR

"The massive displacement in Abidjan and elsewhere is being fuelled by fears of all-out war," said UNHCR spokeswoman Melissa Fleming at the agency's headquarters in Geneva.

She pointed out that the estimate of up to a million displaced was double the figure from just a week ago.

World Tuberculosis Day

March 24th is World Tuberculosis Day--a day to remember how recently in human history the cause of this horrible disease was discovered, and to be reminded of how many people, largely in developing countries, still die from it. 

March 24th commemorates the day in 1882 when Dr Robert Koch astounded the scientific community by announcing that he had discovered the cause of tuberculosis, the TB bacillus. At the time of Koch's announcement in Berlin, TB was raging through Europe and the Americas, causing the death of one out of every seven people. Koch's discovery opened the way towards diagnosing and curing TB.

Is Detroit Disappearing?

The census data for the state of Michigan were released yesterday, and the population decline in Detroit was clearly the biggest headline produced by those data. The New York Times noted that:

Detroit’s population had plunged by 25 percent over the last decade. It was dramatic testimony to the crumbling industrial base of the Midwest, black flight to the suburbs and the tenuous future of what was once a thriving metropolis.

It was the largest percentage drop in history for any American city with more than 100,000 residents, apart from the unique situation of New Orleans, where the population dropped by 29 percent after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, said Andrew A. Beveridge, a sociologist at Queens College.

Are Biofuels Good for Africa?

There is a lot of global discussion about trying to make fuel from just about anything except petroleum (and probably also from nuclear sources) and that discussion seems to lead most easily to oil from plants--biofuels. The BBC has a story, though, about the effect of this movement on Kenya, where...

...An Italian company has asked the authorities for permission to lease 50,000 hectares there to grow jatropha, whose seeds are rich in oil that can be turned into bio-diesel.

This plant, originally from South America, has long been grown in Africa as a hedge to keep out animals - goats stay well away as it is poisonous. The area affected is community land which is being held in trust by the local council.

This expansion has been spurred by the European Union, which has set ambitious goals for lowering greenhouse gas emissions and reducing its reliance on imported oil.

Basically, the EU does not want to use any of its own farmland to grow plants that produce biofuels, so European firms are searching for land in developing countries. That doesn't necessarily sit well with the local population.

Some ask: "Why 'feed' a car in Europe when hunger at home is still a reality?"

"Our future is no longer in our hands. We have been told we have to move because they want to plant jatropha here," said 27-year-old Merciline Koi, a mother of two, who added that there had been no offer of compensation for leaving her home in Dakatcha Woodlands.

Do Frustrated Young People Mean That Revolution is Coming?

The political uprisings in the Middle East have generally been instigated and powered by younger, urban segments of each society. The Iranian revolution of the 1970s was similar in that regard, as are most revolutions. Does that mean that having young, frustrated men in your midst is a dangerous thing? That seems to be the message of an Op-Ed piece in today's New York Times by 24-year-old research assistant Matthew Klein at the Council on Foreign Relations. 

My generation was taught that all we needed to succeed was an education and hard work. Tell that to my friend from high school who studied Chinese and international relations at a top-tier college. He had the misfortune to graduate in the class of 2009, and could find paid work only as a lifeguard and a personal trainer.  Unpaid internships at research institutes led to nothing.  After more than a year he moved back in with his parents.

Millions of college graduates in rich nations could tell similar stories. In Italy, Portugal and Spain, about one-fourth of college graduates under the age of 25 are unemployed. In the United States, the official unemployment rate for this group is 11.2 percent, but for college graduates 25 and over it is only 4.5 percent.

The uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa are a warning for the developed world. Even if an Egyptian-style revolution breaking out in a rich democracy is unthinkable, it is easy to recognize the frustration of a generation that lacks opportunity. Indeed, the “desperate generation” in Portugal got tens of thousands of people to participate in nationwide protests on March 12. How much longer until the rest of the rich world follows their lead?

Blacks are Suburbanizing Throughout the US

One of the clear trends emerging from the 2010 census redistricting data being released state-by-state is that blacks throughout the country were suburbanizing at unexpectedly high rates during the last decade. The Los Angeles Times yesterday reviewed the situation in the southeastern states, where the growth of the Latino population has added a new wrinkle to the region's demographics:

African Americans in the South are shunning city life for the suburbs at the highest levels in decades, rapidly integrating large metropolitan areas that were historically divided between inner-city blacks and suburban whites.

Census figures also show that Latino population growth for the first time outpaced that of blacks and whites in most of the South, adding to the region's racial and ethnic mix.

Arizona Seems to be Rethinking Its Immigration Priorities

There was important news out of Arizona yesterday, where the state Senate defeated several bills that were aimed at even further restrictions on undocumented immigrants.

The Senate voted down bills that sought to provoke a reevaluation by the U.S. Supreme Court of birthright citizenship for the children of illegal immigrants, Senate officials said.

Other defeated measures sought to ban undocumented students from studying at state universities, as well as requiring hospitals and schools to check the legal status of patients and students respectively.

The votes came despite the Senate having a majority of Republicans, generally more sympathetic to such measures than Democrats.

"This was a clear statement that Arizona needs to focus on its priorities, not try to solve the immigration problem," Democratic State Senator Steve Gallardo told Reuters.

Will Japan's Disaster Open the Country to Immigrants?

The genuinely horrific combination of earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear plant meltdowns in Japan has shocked and saddened the entire world. A huge rebuilding of places and lives will, however, be the likely long-term aftermath in one of the richest countries in the world--unlike the slow pace with which Haiti has been rebuilding after its massively destructive earthquake a year ago. Quite naturally, speculation has arisen as to the extent to which Japan will need to rely on foreigners to help in that rebuilding process. Jeanne Batalova of the MPI Data Hub project at the Migration Policy Institute has noted that, at present, there are very few foreigners living in the country (of course, these data do not reflect any post-disaster evacuations):

There were slightly less than 2.2 million foreign nationals residing in Japan in 2009, according to Japan's Ministry of Justice. Since 2000, the foreign population grew by nearly half a million, from 1.7 million. Its share of the total Japan's population also increased from 1.3 percent in 2000 to 1.7 percent in 2009. (For comparison, the 38.5 million immigrants accounted for 12.5 percent of the total US population in 2009.) 

Life Expectancy at All-Time High in the US

The US Centers for Disease Control just released their latest estimates of life expectancy in the US, based on death certificate data for 2009. 

Life expectancy at birth increased to 78.2 years in 2009, up slightly from 78.0 years in 2008. Life expectancy was up two-tenths of a year for males (75.7 years) and up one-tenth of a year for females (80.6 years). Life expectancy for the U.S. white population increased by two-tenths of a year. Life expectancy for black males (70.9 years) and females (77.4 years) was unchanged in 2009. The gap in life expectancy between the white and black populations was 4.3 years in 2009, two-tenths of a year increase from the gap in 2008 of 4.1 years.

Among the Reasons Why a Complete Census Count is Important...

In an era when the US Congress is hacking away at budgets, including that of the Census Bureau, it is good to be reminded of the many ways in which the complete count is critical to our understanding of demographic trends. The Pew Research Center today issued a report showing that the intercensal estimates of the Hispanic population tended to be considerably different from the census count in those states, such as in the Southeast, where the Hispanic population is still relatively small, but is rapidly growing. As Jeff Passel and D'Vera Cohn note:

The six traditional Hispanic states for which Hispanic counts from the 2010 Census have been released include Arizona, California, Colorado, Illinois, New Jersey and Texas. Each has more than a million Hispanic residents and collectively, 31% of their population is Hispanic. As a group, those states house 30 million Hispanics, according to the 2010 Census, yet their aggregate census count was only 88,000 (or .3%) larger than their aggregate census estimate. 

In the other 27 states, Hispanics make up 7% of the total population. These states as a group house 8.7 million Hispanics, and their combined 2010 Census count was 501,000 people (or 6.1%) higher than their combined census estimate. Among them are Alabama, where the Hispanic census count of 186,000 people was 16% higher than its census estimate, the largest gap among states seen so far.

The World Approaches 7 Billion

I routinely refer to the world's population as being 7 billion, but the UN Population Division estimates that we are still just short of that number, although we will reach it during 2011. In anticipation of this event, the National Geographic has created a series of videos exploring the "face" of seven billion, and reliving some of the important transitions that got us to this point. These resources are available on their website: http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/7-billion

Even More Populations at Risk in Japan

As rescue efforts go forward in Japan, it is clear that the number of deaths from the combined earthquake and tsunami will be in the thousands, if not the tens of thousands. The New York Times reports that:

Japanese news media estimates of the death toll from the natural disasters ranged from 1,300 to 1,700, but the total could rise. Many communities were scrambling to find the missing; in the port town of Minamisanriku, nearly 10,000 people were unaccounted for, according to the public broadcaster NHK. Much of the northeast was impassable, and by late Saturday rescuers had not arrived in the worst-hit areas.

The continual swaying and rolling of the ground deepened the disorientation of a nation accustomed to disaster, but which has not experienced anything on this scale for generations.

Residents in the hardest hit northern part of the country are without food and water and, of course, the threat of disease is a serious one, even in a country that has the world's highest life expectancy. On top of that is the fear that at least one, and perhaps two, nuclear plants may experience a meltdown, which will have further horrific consequences.

The developments at two separate nuclear plants prompted the evacuation of more than 200,000 people. Japanese officials said they had also ordered up the largest mobilization of their Self-Defense Forces since World War II to assist in the relief effort.

Populations at Risk in Japan

The largest earthquake ever to hit Japan (8.9 on the Richter Scale), and one of the largest ever recorded on earth hit today, killing at least 300 people, and sending a Tsunami across the Pacific Ocean. The New York Times notes that the deaths are especially related to the fact that the town nearest to the earthquake (which was itself centered off-shore) is on relatively flat ground.

Japanese police officials said that more than 200 bodies were found in Sendai, a port city in the northeastern part of the country and the closest major city to the epicenter, and the government put the official death toll at more than 300. But with many people still missing there and elsewhere, the death toll is expected to rise.

Russians Vote With Their Feet

By all accounts, Russians have plenty to protest about, living in a country rife with corruption and few opportunities to get ahead. Of course, there is no youth bulge to push an agenda to the streets, as has happened in several of the now volatile Arab nations. Indeed, Russia has been slowly losing population since the mid-1990s, due to very low fertility, high mortality (life expectancy for males is about the same as in Ghana), and...outmigration. The Washington Post features a story this week about the slow, but steady leaking of people out of Russia.

The departures are not easily documented because they are mostly unrecorded, but they have become the talk of the independent press and professional circles here. Russians blame their malaise on an authoritarian system in which political limits have settled over society as a whole, dead-ending career opportunities.

Slow Growth Comes to California

The Census 2010 redistricting data for California were released yesterday and, as the NewYork Times notes, the results reveal a substantial slowing of California's population compared to previous decades.

Perhaps the legendary beaches here are losing their pull. California, once the very symbol of sun-drenched American growth, had a population increase of only 10 percent in the last decade, the slowest rise in the state’s history. And for the first time since California was became a state in 1850, it will not gain a Congressional seat.

Here in San Diego the demographic pattern very closely resembled the state pattern, as noted in the San Diego Union-Tribune:

Africans Left in the Lurch in Libyan Mess

The civil war in Libya has created a flood of refugees, as I have already noted. However, today's New York Times reports on the genuine tragedy of sub-Saharan Africans who are stuck at the Tripoli airport (not IN the airport, just AT the airport) and seemingly have no way out of the country.

As wealthier nations send boats and planes to rescue their citizens from the violence in Libya, a new refugee crisis is taking shape on the outskirts of Tripoli, where thousands of migrant workers from sub-Saharan Africa have been trapped with scant food and water, no international aid and little hope of escape.

The migrants — many of them illegal immigrants from Ghana and Nigeriawho have long constituted an impoverished underclass in Libya — live amid piles of garbage, sleep in makeshift tents of blankets strung from fences and trees, and breathe fumes from a trench of excrement dividing their camp from the parking lot of Tripoli’s airport.

Utah Creates Its Own Guestworker Program

The State of Utah has joined Arizona in passing laws that may well step on federal immigration prerogatives, but in a distinctly different direction. Arizona's laws were basically intended to scare workers away, whereas Utah has decided to move in a more positive direction, as noted in today's New York Times:

Utah’s package includes measures to tighten enforcement against illegal immigrants that echo Arizona’s tough stance — like a requirement that the police check the immigration status of anyone arrested on a felony or a serious misdemeanor charge.

But supporters said the hybrid package offered an alternative to states, including those controlled by Republicans, that are seeking to avoid the costly political polarization and legal challenges that followed Arizona’s law and that also want to recognize the need of some businesses for immigrant labor in spite of high unemployment nationally.

The guest worker bill came after intense lobbying by business and farm groups as well as by some immigrant advocates, and it enjoyed the quiet but all-important endorsement of the Mormon Church. It is likely to raise many of the same constitutional questions as the Arizona law, including whether it intrudes on areas of immigration law reserved exclusively for the federal government. Central provisions of Arizona’s law, known as S. B. 1070, were suspended by federal courts pending a lawsuit by the Obama administration.

But in contrast to Arizona’s approach, Utah lawmakers framed their bill to set up a negotiation, rather than a confrontation, between the governor and the federal authorities. Gov. Gary R. Herbert, a Republican who handily won election in November, is expected to sign the bill.

Under one bill approved on Friday, Utah would issue a two-year work permit to illegal immigrants who could prove that they had been living and working in the state. To qualify, immigrants would have to pass a criminal background check and pay fines of up to $2,500.

The bill gives the governor until 2013 to negotiate with federal immigration authorities for a waiver for the guest worker program. Under federal law, it is a violation for an employer to knowingly hire an illegal immigrant. If no waiver has been obtained by then, the guest worker program would go into effect anyway.

Europe Gets Even Less Immigrant Friendly

A report out today from the Associated Press details the various ways in which European nations have been making life ever harder for immigrants (in this case, legal ones) to get a job. The lead is about Italy, which now requires that workers demonstrate a knowledge of the Italian language before they can be issued a work permit.

Some immigrant advocates worry that as harsh economic times make it harder for natives to keep jobs, such measures will become more a vehicle for intolerance than integration. Others say it's only natural that newcomers learn the language of their host nation, seeing it as a condition to ensure they can contribute to society.

So far, Italy is only giving a gentle turn to the screw. Cojochru and other test-takers described the exam as easy. No oral skills were tested.

But the story from Italy is just the tip of the iceberg.

Canadian 2011 Census Will Be Short-Form Only

Preparations are well underway for the 2011 Census of Canada, which will be conducted in May. Following the lead of the United States, the long form has been abolished and only a small set of data will be obtained from each household. The questionnaires will be mailed out, but they can also be completed online. Statistics Canada has a pretty simple description of the process:

The questionnaire asks basic questions such as age, sex, marital status, relationship to others in the household and mother tongue. The paper questionnaire has enough space for answers from six people. If more than six people live in a household, call the Census Help Line for another questionnaire. It is important to count everyone.

Unfortunately, the decision last year to get rid of the long form was not a statistical or procedural one, but seems largely to have been driven by politics. The Conservative government appeared to feel that questions asked on the long form represented an invasion of privacy. 

Statistics Canada will, however, collect additional data:

The information previously collected by the long-form census questionnaire will be collected as part of the new voluntary National Household Survey (NHS). This questionnaire will cover most of the same topics as the 2006 Census.

The National Household Survey will be conducted within four weeks of the May 2011 Census and will include approximately 4.5 million households.

More Demographic Fallout From the Libyan Revolt

Amid the violence in Libya, guest workers from African and Asian nations are leaving in droves--or at least they are trying to leave. The New York Times reports that 180,000 people are piled up at the Libyan borders with Tunisia to the northwest and Egypt to the east. 

Appealing for international help on Wednesday, the United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, said: “We need concrete action on the ground to provide humanitarian and medical assistance. Time is of the essence. Thousands of lives are at risk.”

Several aid groups were operating on the Tunisian and Egyptian borders, handing out food and supplies to the refugees and assessing the situation for providing more help.

But it was the Tunisian border that worried aid groups the most.

“There is an absolutely mammoth task that is absolutely imperative” to ease pressure on the border area, Sybella Wilkes, a spokeswoman for the United Nations refugee agency in Geneva, said Wednesday. “The capacity of the border area is bursting.”

At the same time, the disruption of the oil supply from Libya has caused a sharp increase in gas prices, as anyone who drives already knows, and this is cascading into higher food prices because so many of the inputs to agriculture depend upon petroleum.

The Food Price Index, which monitors average monthly price changes for a variety of key staples, rose to 236 points in February from 231 points in January, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said.

It was the highest level since FAO began monitoring prices in 1990.

"Unexpected oil price spikes could further exacerbate an already precarious situation in food markets," David Hallam, director of the Rome-based FAO's trade and market division, was quoted as saying in a statement.

The Food Balancing Act

Philosophers through the ages, including Aristotle, Confucius, and Buddha, have extolled the virtue of the golden man, of balance, of the middle way. When it comes to world food security issues, we seem to have lost that way. There are literally billions of people in the world who have too little to eat, while another billion or two have dramatically more than they need to eat. The danger of eating too much, especially when it is not very nutritious, is illustrated by the global trend in obesity. Obesity is closely related to type 2 diabetes, which has been implicated in a shortening of life expectancy in Europe and North America, and almost certainly elsewhere.

The analysis used pooled medical information for 820,900 people from nearly 100 studies done mostly in Europe and North America. The results are published in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine.

A 50-year-old with diabetes dies six years sooner than someone without the disease, and not just from a heart attack or a stroke, new research suggests.

The large international effort to measure diabetes' toll found the disease also raises the risk of dying prematurely from a host of other ailments, even breast cancer and pneumonia.

 "It's quite a wide sweep of conditions," said Dr. John Danesh of Cambridge University in Britain, who led the team of researchers. While most people think of heart problems, diabetes surprisingly "appears to be associated with a much broader range of health implications than previously suspected."Putting the six years lost in context, he said, long-term smoking shortens life by 10 years.

Smoking Still a Health Risk in the United States

Americans are smoking a lot less than they used to, and that's a good thing. But heavy smoking in the past is still killing people at the older ages in the US and that is an important reason why life expectancy lags behind other rich nations. This is one of the conclusions of a new report from the National Research Council titled “Explaining Divergent Levels of Longevity in High-Income Countries, edited by Eileen M. Crimmins, Samuel H. Preston, and Barney Cohen. Professor Preston, from the University of Pennsylvania, and literally the world's foremost authority on this topic, was interviewed by The Nation's Health, a publication of the American Public Health Association, which summarized the findings:

Over the past 25 years, life expectancy at age 50 in the United States has been increasing, but at a much slower rate than in some other high-income countries. Researchers attribute the slower rate of increase — for women in the United States the increase was about 40 percent smaller than in other countries — to widespread smoking 30 to 50 years ago.