9.8 billion mouths in 2050!

When Stephen Hawking says Earth is under threat so leave this planet, he actually wants to say get the hell out of here when there is still time. He suggests humans should find and colonise a nearby planet that is almost similar to Earth. We can even go to the moon as an option! He strongly believes this planet of ours will crumble and disappear one day, thereby bringing an end to the human species. But Hawking does not want such an inglorious end to this highly intelligent species. Well, since we cannot fathom his level of intelligence, we had better pay heed to what he says. But let us make some attempts to understand why he has been saying this for so many years now.

One reason we may conjecture is his shock at the unbridled growth of population and resulting chaos in terms of widespread pollution, global warming and destruction of nature. The more the worst — and that is exactly what is happening with the world at present. Hawking possibly has done some basic calculation regarding how much Earth can take from continued mineral mining, underground lifting, fresh water pollution, sea water pollution, carbon emission, global warming, forest depletion, ozone layer depletion, plastic and human waste deposition and so on and so forth. At 7 plus billion, the world's population is already too much, especially in some continents.

In some of those high population areas, food and water shortage is leading to famine and deaths. But deaths are not stopping the birth of new babies and that again at a frightening rate. In almost all South Asian and African countries the bulk of the population has a very low level of living standards. Most of them live in slums and procreate aimlessly to add to the socio-economic burdens. In Muslim majority countries, family planning is discouraged and often vehemently opposed by the religious preachers, who term the practice un-Islamic. The political rulers of the day do not want to talk much about family planning for fear of losing Muslim votes.

Let us have a look at the scenario looming ahead. The latest UN report says: the current world population of 7.6 billion will jump to 9.8 billion in 2050. And the procreating giant India, the second most populous country with 1.3 billion at present, will surpass China's 1.4 billion, in about seven years, by 2024. Enough to make socio-economic planners to see nightmares every night!

There is more. The UN reports tells us Nigeria's population will go beyond that of the United States of America by 2050 to become the third most populous country in the world. Nearly 83 million people are being added to the world population every year and at that rate the global population will reach 8.6 billion in 2030, 9.8 billion in 2050 and 11.2 billion in 2100, the report reveals.

Dear beleaguered Earth, take this with a pinch of salt. "Nigeria is growing most rapidly, and the population in 26 African countries is likely to 'at least double' by 2050." The report further says that 'the number of persons aged 60 or above is expected to more than double by 2050 and more than triple by 2100.  The aging population is projected to rise from 962 million globally in 2017 to 2.1 billion in 2050 and 3.1 billion in 2100.'

We know there is 0% population growth in some countries. But, in other countries it is growing either slowly or rapidly. Even China now allows two children on special cases. The urban educated working class however is still happy with one child as parents cannot take the pressure of job and raising more children at the same time.

It is being commented by many that the population of Muslim countries, except for a few, is growing more rapidly than in the non-Muslim countries. One reason social researchers tend to identify is the forceful preaching by some Islamic clerics for increasing the number of Muslims so that some day they can take over the entire world. What the preachers never talk about is how would billions of Muslims in a resource-depleted future world survive? They do not even want to know how the present 1.86 billion Muslims are managing to survive immersed in illiteracy and poverty. Poverty and illiteracy are dominant in most Muslim communities all over the world.

It seems Hawking has made his mental calculation before telling us why Planet Earth will become unlivable in a couple of hundred years for the humans. There is likelihood that scientists in rich countries have already started to develop space ships to ferry the rich and the strong to distant planets to build new settlements. They will surely leave behind the poor, the weak and the religious freaks on this dying planet.