Population Composition
Economic development has little to do with how crowded a place is. Bangladesh and Japan-densely populated. But, Japan is more economically developed than Bangladesh. People vary in age, sex, literacy level, health condition, occupation and income level. Population composition refers to the structure of the population.
The composition of the population helps to know- the number of males or females, the age group they belong to, how educated they are, what type of occupations they are employed in, and what their income levels and health conditions are. People can study the population composition of a country by looking at the population pyramid or the age-sex pyramid.
A population pyramid shows
• The total population is divided into various age groups, e.g., 5 to 9 years, 10 to 14 years.
• The percentage of the total population, subdivided into males and females, in each of those groups.
The numbers of children (below 15 years) are shown at the bottom and reflect the level of births. The size of the top shows the numbers of aged people (above 65 years) and reflects the number of deaths. The population pyramid also tells us how many dependents there are in a country. There are two groups of dependents — young dependents (aged below 15 years) and elderly dependents (aged over 65 years). Those of working age are economically active.
The population pyramid of Kenya
The population pyramid shown above for Kenya has birth and death rates both high, hence it is broad at the base and rapidly narrows towards the top. This is because although many children are born, a large percentage of them die in their infancy, relatively few become adults, and there are very few old people.
Population Pyramid of India
In countries like India, where death rates (especially amongst the very young) are decreasing, the pyramid is broad in the younger age groups because more infants survive to adulthood. This can be seen in the pyramid above for India. Such populations contain a relatively large number of young people and which means a strong and expanding labour force.
In countries like Japan, low birth rates make the pyramid narrow at the base. Decreased death rates allow numbers of people to reach old age. Skilled, spirited and hopeful young people endowed with a positive outlook are the future of any nation.
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