Impacts Of A Youthful Population

There are many impacts of a youthful population and the effects are shown in Uganda.
Due to many young people unemployment is common as there aren’t enough jobs for young people when they grow up. More unemployment means more people are dependent on government support as shown by 22% of Uganda’s youth is unemployed. Increased poverty is an impact as more young people are born into families that are already poor, so there are more people in poverty. Some children may have to work to help support their large family, so they can’t go to school, which means they can’t break out of poverty.

There is increased pressure on public services there’s a greater demand for services like schools and childcare

Rapid population growth results in large numbers of children growing up and having families too, increasing the population further. This contributes to overpopulation if there aren’t enough resources to cope with the number of people

Housing is a basic human need and has implications for health and productivity of a population. Rapid increase in population has not been matched by the growth and development in basic physical infrastructure and the provision of adequate housing and social amenities is not keeping pace with demand. Outcomes include over-crowding, growth of slums and deterioration. Very low numbers have access to electricity and safe drinking water and pit latrines are the dominant form of toilet facility.

The youthful population accounts for a substantial expansion of the labour force, which is mainly engaged in agriculture and the informal sector. The potential labour force is expected to double between 1991-2021 to reach 16.8million. Very few employment opportunities can be generated in the formal sector and these limited opportunities for growth in the economy increase problems of unemployment, underemployment, rural-urban migration and crime.

As Gambia is an LEDC, they lack the funds to employ a vast amount of doctors to the area. This means that for every doctor, there are 14,536 patients meaning that the inhabitants don’t receive much healthcare. This has contributed to a relatively short life expectancy of just 54 years for a man and 57 years for a woman. The lack of healthcare available has also meant that there is an extremely high infant mortality rate of 73 per 1000 people, even though it is lower than it has been in the past. As many children die at an early age, parents tend to have a large number of children to help with daily tasks, to bring a higher income to the family and to look after the parents when they reach ill health. Gambia has a high birth rate of 40 per 1000 people because of this and in 2003, the average fertility rate was 5.13.

Due the high birth rate, falling infant mortality rate and improvements in the level of healthcare available, the population has been increasing rapidly. In fact, Gambia’s population doubles every 28 years and in 2009, it is estimated to be around 1.7million people.

63.55% of the population is estimated to be aged below 25 years and only 3.36% of the population is aged over 65 years. This had meant that there is a high dependency ratio of 86:100 working people. Each working person has to earn enough to support 1.86 people including themselves, which makes trying to earn a living in an LEDC an even harder task than it already is.

Increased pressure on public services- there’s a greater demand for services like schools and childcare

Rapid population growth- the large numbers of children grow up and have families too, increasing the population. This may lead to overpopulation if there aren’t enough resources to cope with the number of people

Too few jobs- there aren’t enough jobs for young people when they grow up. More unemployment means more people are dependent on government support Increased poverty- more young people are born into families that are already poor, so there are more people in poverty. Some children may have to work to help support their large family, so they can’t go to school, which means they can’t break out of poverty

Health of mothers and children is negatively affected by high fertility;
Early child-bearing has a number of socio-economic and health consequences
Teenage pregnancies increases the number of young mothers who lack material resources to support their children – can affect the initial development and growth of their children.
Encourages school dropout which then acts as a barrier to the educational and career advancement of women and their future independence.
Exposure to aids is increased with early pregnancies.

Increased demand for Health services
Demand for health services is rising due to high fertility (and increased further by the recent AIDS epidemic) but the health infrastructure is insufficient to cope with this and is characterised by uneven distribution and poor access to facilities and low per capita expenditure.

Labour force and employment
The youthful population accounts for a substantial expansion of the labour force, which is mainly engaged in agriculture and the informal sector. The potential labour force is expected to double between 1991-2021 to reach 16.8million. Very few employment opportunities can be generated in the formal sector and these limited opportunities for growth in the economy increase problems of unemployment, underemployment, rural-urban migration and crime.

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Housing is a basic human need and has implications for health and productivity of a population. Rapid increase in population has not been matched by the growth and development in basic physical infrastructure and the provision of adequate housing and social amenities is not keeping pace with demand. Outcomes include over-crowding, growth of slums and deterioration. Very low numbers have access to electricity and safe drinking water and pit latrines are the dominant form of toilet facility.