News
Events

Read our latest news stories and blog posts about population matters around the world.

 

11 January 2017

Chris Packham speaks out on impact of population

I remember when this was all fields full of birds and butterflies.” It’s a cliché isn’t it . . . but those words frequently describe changes most adults have seen if they have been fortunate enough to spend time in the countryside. It’s also a powerful metaphor for the wider situation we find ourselves in today.

Read more

Biodiversity
Environment
UK population
World population
9 December 2016

Panic and pragmatism: population in Korea and Japan

South Korea’s official statistics agency has just announced that it expects the country’s population to shrink by 8 million over the next 50 years. Currently around  50 million, the agency projects that the population will peak at 52.96 million in 2031 and then gradually decline to 43 million in 2065.

Read more

Asia population
Families
World population
4 November 2016

30 million more women accessing contraception than in 2012

The FP2020 international family planning initiative has released its fourth annual progress report. The global programme seeks to have 120 million more women able to access modern contraception than in 2012.

Read more

Family planning
27 October 2016

WWF: we are facing the next global mass extinction

The 2016 Living Planet report published by WWF today pulls no punches in describing the devastation to our natural world caused by human activity. The report calculates that by 2020 populations of wild vertebrate animals will have declined by nearly 70 per cent since 1970.

Read more

Biodiversity
Environment
World population
15 September 2016

State of Nature report overlooks population growth impact

On September 14th, more than 50 nature conservation and research organisations published the 2016 State of Nature report. The report found evidence of significant losses in biodiversity in the UK but overlooked the impact of population growth.

Read more

Biodiversity
Environment
UK population
27 August 2016

Teen pregnancy rates continue to fall

The Family Planning Association (FPA) has recently reported on the latest teenage pregnancy figures from the Office for National Statistics, which recorded a 6.4 per cent decrease in teenage pregnancies in England and Wales for the second quarter of 2015 vs. the same period for the previous year.

Read more

Family planning
UK population
Women's rights
14 July 2016

Our 25th anniversary

The Optimum Population Trust (OPT) was founded by David Willey and others on 24 July 1991. Its goals were: “to collect, analyze and disseminate information about the sizes of global and national populations and to link this to a study of carrying capacities and inhabitants’ quality of life in order to support policy decisions.”

Read more

Environment
UK population
World population
28 January 2016

Campaigning for more UK aid for family planning

Access to family planning services is vital to poverty reduction and the success of the sustainable development goals (SDGs).

Read more

Development
Family planning
3 July 2014

Porritt on British e-NGOs and population

It doesn’t take too long to open up incredibly divisive discussions about population, development and the environment. For instance, how would you respond to the following facts?

Read more

Environment
UK population
World population