Thread: Britain to be biggest country in Europe by 2050

Britain will be the biggest country in Europe by 2050, overtaking both France and Germany, according to official projections.

By Harry Wallop, Consumer Affairs Editor
Published: 4:56PM BST 29 Jul 2010



Europe's population will fall in the next 40 years, but Britain's population will swell by 15 million to hit 77 million Photo: PA


Britain will see its population swell from today's 62.2 million to 77 million, an increase of 24 per cent.

This will make it bigger than France, projected to be 70 million and Germany, which is predicted to have 71.5 million citizens.

The forecasts come form the Population Reference Bureau, a US body which supplies data to governments and institutions around the world.
The predictions suggest that Britain will see its population increase over the next 40 years at a far faster rate than nearly every other European country. The extra 15 million equates to the combined populations of Glasgow, Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds and Liverpool being added to the total national population over the next two generations.
Britain's population has started to climb sharply in recent years. Last year the Office for National Statistics indicated that mothers had more children than at any time since 1973.
Immigrant mothers accounted for more than half of the increase in births, but the fertility rate among British-born women also rose sharply.
The Population Reference Bureau predicts that France's population, in contrast, will increase at half the rate, adding 7 million to its 63 million. While Germany will actually see its population fall sharply from 81.6 million to 71.5 million because of a lack of immigration, and a far lower birth rate than that in Britain. It already has the second oldest population in the world after Japan, with one in five of all Germans over the age of 65.
Europe, in total, will see its population dip from 739 million to 720 million, because of its low birth rate.
The world's population will increase inexorably, swelling from 6.89 billion to 9.49 billion. India will be responsible for a significant part of this increase, becoming the largest country in the world by overtaking China.
The country, which hit 1 billion just a decade ago and now has a population of 1.19 billion, is expected to hit 1.75 billion, adding the equivalent of the entire population of the European Union in a mere 40 years.
China's population will increase, but relatively modestly, moving from 1.34 billion to 1.48 billion.

Britain to be biggest country in Europe by 2050 - Telegraph

A race to the bottom.

It's already full.

Originally Posted by sabang

It's already full.

Will it sink in the next winterstorm?

allready sunk!!!
uk flooded with eu member's why not,free health care,school's,benifit's...
100 british family's emagrating every week or was it a month can't remember.

Islamic?

Originally Posted by Bangyai

YUK

Glad I am not there.

Forget the UK stats, what is more worrying is the total world population increasing from 6 bill to over 9 billion, how are these people going to be fed and have access to water etc. this is the type of shite that will cause civil unrest and wars.

Water will be the critical factor. I hate to say it but the world population projections will probably exceed reality by a large margin because people are going to start dieing of thirst, disease, and starvation at a much higher rate in the not too distant future.

Have a nice day!

Actually it is more likely to lead to disease.

Spot the happy face?

And they all look so happy.

Originally Posted by mikediver

Water will be the critical factor.

Maybe. I believe 10 billion people can be fed as long as we have oil.

When that runs out and the remaining resources become prohibitively expensive, the dreamers of organic farming will wake up and realize that without chemical fertilizers, cheap long distance transport, and industrial farming we will barely be able to adequately feed 3 billion people if that many.

Scotland will be independent by then so England will be further overpopulated.

^Scrub that who eats oil post.
Had some deep fried chicken stuff today that I am sure was cooked in Castrol GTX or some other 17 year old motor oil.

Going back to the OP.
How many of these stressed out U.K nationals don't have receeding hairlines?
I counted 6 and 2 of those were birds!

Americans, being happy.

And some Indian people being happy.

And some African people being happy. When will people take the World seriously?

Grow up

Originally Posted by Bogon

Who eats oil?

Agriculture today is heavily dependent on oil for the production of fertilizers and running agricultural machines. Take that away and food production will go way down.

Originally Posted by Bogon

Man. That's just picking numbers from your arse or Wiki.

Admitted. Those numbers are pure guesswork from my side, not scientifically worked out. But they show the trend. With industrial agriculture we can feed a lot of people. Without we cannot. Especially fertilizer and pesticides depend heavily on oil and they are needed for high yields.

Originally Posted by Bogon

Take a chill pill and worry about important stuff.

This is the important stuff.

And so the goal is to feed people ad infinitum.

With no limits. And the rest of the biosphere?

Fool.

Well, this isn't guesswork:

Population growth at current rates is unsustainable. And I wish I didn't know the results.