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Words in the News

24th October 2011

Countdown to seven billionth baby



Today begins the one-week countdown to 31st October when the world population will reach seven billion. That's a rise of two billion in less than a quarter century. This report is from Barbara Plett.

Seven days from now the world's seven billionth baby will be born. That's according to the UN's projections, and it's using the milestone to take stock of trends in population growth.

The big question is how long the planet can continue to satisfy the voracious appetite of its growing number of human inhabitants.

In fact, over the past six decades, the global fertility rate has been cut in half.

Statistically from five children per woman to 2.5. But 78 million babies are still being born every year, almost all of them in developing countries.

The UN says women in these countries are having so many babies because of poverty, lack of education, income and access to birth control.

Not only that, they and their children face a high risk of poor health and early death. So the UN is highlighting the need to boost education and employment opportunities for poor women: in other words, address the poverty and the demography will look after itself, as it did in Europe.



Barbara Plett, BBC News, New York





Words in the News

© British Broadcasting Corporation 2011



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Vocabulary and definitions



projections

calculations and estimates

the milestone

the significant number

to take stock of

to think carefully about something with a view to developing a policy about it

trends

changes over time

the voracious appetite of

the using up of resources at a very fast rate

fertility rate

average number of children born to each woman

access to

availability of

to boost

to increase and improve

address

find an answer to the problem of

the demography

the high birth rates in undeveloped countries



More on this story:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-15368276

Read and listen to the story and the vocabulary online:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/language/wordsinthenews/2011/10/111024_witn_seven_billion.shtml





Words in the News

© British Broadcasting Corporation 2011



Page 2 of 2

bbclearningenglish.com