This sudden increase in the population of the developing countries has come at a difficult time. Even if their population had not grown so fast they would have been facing a desperate struggle to bring the standard of living of their people up to the point at which there was enough food, housing, education, medical care and employment for everyone to have a reasonable life.The poor countries are having to run faster and faster in their economic activity in order to stay in the same place, and the gap in wealth between rich and poor countries grows wider every year.
The most pressing problem created by the rapid increase in population is a shortage of food. More mouths have to be fed every year and yet a high proportion of the existing population are not getting enough of the right kind of food. Over the past two years the total amount of food has decreased, and of course the total amount of food per person has decreased even more sharply.
More and more of the babies born in developing countries have been surviving infancy, and now nearly half the people living in those countries are under the age of 15. The adults have to work harder than ever to provide for the needs of the children,who cannot contribute to the economy until they are older. There is a shortage of schools and teachers, and there are not enough hospitals, doctors and nurses. Farming land is becoming scarce,so country people are moving to the towns and cities in the hope of finding a better standard of living. But the cities have not been able to provide housing, and the newcomers live in crowded slums.Finally, there are too few jobs, and unemployment leads to further poverty.
