POPULATION OF ASIA “Explosion” Under Way

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28528, 6 March 1958, Page 16

POPULATION OF ASIA “Explosion” Under Way

KUALA LUMPUR, March 4. A United Nations survey said today that a real population “explosion” which could have disastrous effects was under way in The economic survey is to be presented at the annual meeting of the Economic Commission for Asia and the Far East, which opens in Kuala Lumpur today. The survey says the region has great untapped assets including valuable mineral resources, the large hydro-electric potential of Asia’s rivers and resources of special advantage in the atomic age.

“But the ever-mounting numbers of the people themselves are creating in many countries an issue which ... is likely to prove still more decisive.” It says that if present trends continue the E.C.A.F.E. region will have by 1980 a population; about as large as the total present population of the world. And by 2000 A.D. China and India alone will have this same population. “These facts are enough to point the clear possibility that hopes of raising per capita incomes may be defeated if population growth continues unchecked. “For this reason, the greatest importance is attached to the consideration now being given in a number of countries of the region, to means of bringing the population curve under control of, national policy, in the national and international interest.” Reviewing economic progress in the Asian region in 1957, the survey says that although economic conditions were satisfactory in agriculture and industry, demand on the whole was greater than supply. This had brought about inflationary pressures and adverse trade balances.