Indians may live as long as Americans by 2050: UN Report

The average Indians may live almost as long as the average US citizens does today, a report entitled, '2006 World Population Prospects' released, March 14, by the population division of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, has revealed.

India's life expectancy is projected to increase from the current 64.7 years to 75.6 years, according to the report. The average current figure for the people in US is 77.5 years.

However, longer lives and declining birth rates means that by 2050 India may face the problem of an ageing population, a problem many countries, including China, are facing today.

By 2050, the number of Indians aged above 80 will increase more than six times from the current number of 78 lakh to nearly 5.14 crore. The number of people over 65 years of age in the country will almost quadruple from 6.4 crore in 2005 to 23.9 crore, while those aged 60 and above will increase from 8.4 crore (7.5 percent of the population in 2005) to 33.5 crore (20.2 percent) in the next 43 years.

The report, holding declining fertility rate and increasing longevity of populations to be the two main causes behind countries ageing rapidly, has also warned that the population aged between 15 and 24 years of age in India will decrease from 21.8 crore (19.3 percent) to 21 crore (12.7 percent).

India's fertility rate in the age group of 25–29 years will dip from 160 to 107 while that in the age group of 30–34 years of age will fall from 81.9 to 61 by 2050. Despite the declining fertility, India's population is expected to increase from 1.13 billion to 1.65 billion, making it comfortably the most populous nation on earth by 2050.

This means the addition to India's population in the next 43 years will be almost equal to the population of the country at the time of the 1971 census. The addition is also way above the current population of any other country except China.