I was sent this write up and thought to share.


This is a topic that is very close to my heart so I have taken it upon myself to spread the message and create awareness so that we can start renewing our mind-set.

The United Nations states that Nigeria is the 6th most populous country and estimates that if the population continues at this rate, we’ll exceed 730 million by 2050; third behind only India and China. The Nigerian Population Commission (NPC) states that Nigeria is about 167 million and should reach 188million in 3 years’ time and 221 million by 2020 (these figures are just in Nigeria alone and we know that millions of us live abroad). If not watched, this growth rate will lead to population explosion and hence more unemployment and poverty in the country. At a fertility rate of 5.7 (meaning that an average Nigerian woman has almost 6 children in her lifetime), we are the 6th highest in the world and it comes as no surprise that countries with the highest fertility rates are also the poorest countries of the world.

For a developing nation, this puts a lot of pressure on the society and our resources. Imagine that about 20 million people are living in Lagos and people are wondering why we are always stuck in traffic and there’s no constant light! It’s not ONLY government’s fault, the answer is simple – there are too many people sharing too little resources!

Many of us believe that children are a gift from God! That is absolutely true! But that doesn’t mean that women should convert all the eggs in their ovaries into babies. Also there is the belief that if you don’t have a male or female child, you must continue to have babies until one comes along. That is another fallacy that has caused so many families to exceed the number of children they can afford thereby sending their children into child labour, neo-slavery aka house-helps, even child trafficking!

Our urban areas are overcrowded, our schools are overpopulated; most of us that went to universities in Nigeria don’t need an oracle to tell us that they are also overpopulated (we were 220 students in my class!). And that is not even the worst of it. The unemployment rate in the country is about 24% (10,000 applicants for 1 position, anyone?); meaning that about a quarter of the young and able (ages 16-35) don’t have anything to do. And we know what they say, an idle mind is the devils workshop; no wonder there is so much violence, yahoo-yahoo, and the widespread low level corruption because everyone is trying to make an extra 5naira to survive. Yes there is a lot of government corruption and mismanagement but we also need to wise up and do our part to make things easier for ourselves.
Having 5 children or more is a totally different ball game from having 2-3 children; the parents among us can attest to that.

Change can start from one person so guys spread the word, be an instrument of change.
Tell your Nigerian families, friends, neighbours, colleagues, workers and even church members. Let’s not wait until it’s too bad before we retrace our steps and educate ourselves.

Information is power!
Let’s take our future in our hands.
God bless our country Nigeria!!!

If you feel me please forward this to all your family & friends and don’t forget the ones on facebook

With life expectancy of just 52, Nigerian population growth is at an all-time high, it leaves one to wonder what will happen when our health care system is fully revamped, when the standard of living gets appreciably better and preventive medicine fully accessed on individual basis..



Maximum number of two children per couple seems highly advisable

I am delighted that we have such here on nairaland and I pray that our youth will not be mislead by people whose aim is to see that only there clique live a better life while they deceive others into giving birth to many children because God says so or my religion says so in this our generation only to keep a certain set of people in abject poverty in order to certify their selfish desire.


It will be good to have our youth with a mind set of having at least 2 children for their entire life here, so that you don't spend your entire life taking care of your children when you are suppose to be having your grand children around you.


We need God help, because the way people are going about this issue is really not helping the nation and the worse is that only the government end up receiving the blame for not creating job simply because a certain man or the other can't gain control over his manhood.
May God help is all oh so we don't end up one day as enemy of what we believe is good.

Take it or leave it high population is blessing to any country...it's just left for the government to do the right thing

Maccoy1:
Take it or leave it high population is blessing to any country...it's just left for the government to do the right thing

Population is not a Blessing oo

The government should rather try to control

You sound like an offspring of the great pessimist Malthus!

Anyway, the solution is don't go overboard trying to control population - just educate the populace. An educated people think better and generally know their left from right

Yungwizzzy:


Population is not a Blessing oo

The government should rather try to control

yes they should try to control it, but for now 9ja's population is a blessing. So also India,USA,BRAZIL....

Nigeria's population is insane. Yet ppl still talk of having 5 or 6. How do u plan to care for them?

Maccoy1:
yes they should try to control it, but for now 9ja's population is a blessing. So also India,USA,BRAZIL....

How can you compare 9ja with USA? For a DEVELOPING country, we are too many for the land mass to say nothing about the available resources.

If you believe that BS about Nigeria being overpopulated then you need help!
In fact Africa on average is underpopulated. This is why Africa is underdeveloped. The last thing it needs is western liberals telling them that it needs to reduce it's population, so that westerners can continue to overconsume!