Use Food to Curb Population Growth

The world population reached 7 billion. I do not know about anyone else here, but that is not a good thing. I posted a question on Facebook asking my friends how they think we can curb population growth without forcing anybody to do something they do not want to do. The universal answer was education. I am not so sure.

Economics plays a vital role in controlling population growth. Let me put it this way. In countries with a high cost of living, parents are detered from having more than a couple of kids. Children are very expensive. They need diapers, clothing, toys, food, vaccines, dentists, books, playgroups, and a lot more I am forgetting to list. Contrast this with a rural area where they cost of raising a child is low, like rural Pakistan, India, Ethiopia or China. Children in these countries have minimal education and contribute greatly working on the farm. In rural countries there is an incentive to have babies, especially males, because they can work for the family.



We can infer that encouraging economic development and urbanization in less developed countries may eventually lead to lower population growth. Unfortunately that is only wishful thinking. A great part of the world resist change or outside influence of any kind. There are too many hurdles to overcome.

The Indian government paid rural women to get IUDs. The women would get the IUD's, collect the money then have the IUDs removed by another doctor for a lesser amount. They went to another government agency to get a new IUD put in, and collect payment as second time. These people are so poor that they were swindling the government out of a very small amount of money. India canned the project and started hiring social workers to coerce women into sterilization.

Indian has come under fire by Human Rights Watch because of these coercive sterilization practices. Health workers are sometimes fired if they encourage women to use birth control instead of sterilization. This is not exactly an ethical way to go.

Country NamePopulationYear of Estimate
China1,343,239,9232012
India1,205,073,6122012
United States313,847,4652012
Indonesia248,645,0082012
Brazil199,321,4132012
Pakistan190,291,1292012
Nigeria170,123,7402012
Bangladesh161,083,8042012
Russia142,517,6702012
Russia142,517,6702012
Japan127,368,0882012
Mexico114,975,4062012
Philippines103,775,0022012
Vietnam91,519,2892012
Ethiopia91,195,6752012
Egypt83,688,1642012
Germany81,305,8562012




The top three countries that need to work on their population controls are China, India, and the United States. I lived in Mexico for a couple years with my husband and had some ideas about how to deter population growth there. I am not sure if this would work in the United States of America, but here is my idea for Mexico.

Mexico Family Planning Service would accept females between the ages of 15 and 27. Each participant will be documented in the database. The service will give the women their choice of IUD or Norplant. The payout for these women is a bag of groceries every month. This might seem silly to Americans, but in Mexico this is a big deal. People there are very poor.

The bag will include: either ham, or chicken, or beef. It will contain beans, eggs, vegetables, fruit, and some processed foods. The bags will be the same every month, but the contents will change around the year to accommodate the calendar.

The food will come from a government farm and private businesses. Each bag will have about a $15.00 value. The bag must contain healthy foods with good sources of fat, protein and carbohydrates. The function is two fold: curb population while ensuring the population we do have are not malnourished.

The women will be examined by the doctor once every six months, then once a year to ensure that the birth control is in place and working. The women will continue to receive the nutritional supplement until they reach their 27's birthday or removed the birth control.

Mexico is like India to the degree that these people are so poor they will think of a million ways to out smart the system. It would not be cheap, but it would not be the most expensive project either. I see how it would improve society greatly. The poor will be fed, young children will receive better nourishment, and the population will be greatly curbed.

Naomi



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