‘40 percent of Filipinos are 15 or younger’

I watched the BBC on silver projects and senior living residential real estate developments in Singapore for their aging population, as I waited to read the interesting Inquirer editorial of July 16 on the population boom.

Demographic projections of the UN’s Department of Economic and Social Affairs, prepared by its Population Division and published in the Zenith News Agency website in March 2001, saw the developed world with dramatic below-replacement birth rates in 39 countries by 2050.  By then there will be two senior citizens for every child.

Today we know that 40 percent of Japan’s population are 60 years old or older. China, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand and Malaysia suffer population declines. Population decline also exists in the US, Canada, Australia, Russia, the UK, France, Germany, Spain and Italy.

The population of the Third World, by contrast, and according to the UN 2001 projections, will rise from 4.9 billion in 2000 to 8.2 billion in 2050.  The proportion of the population aged 60 and above will rise from 8 percent to 20 percent in 2050 in less-developed countries.

The Philippines’ total fertility rate today is 2.9 children per woman of reproductive age, down from 3.3 a decade ago, and headed to the replacement rate of 2.1 projected a decade from now.

From there, we will join the countries with exploding pension-age populations, with the flat or declining labor forces to create the potential for significant fiscal shortfalls.

Forty percent of the Philippine population today are 15 or  younger. Is it surprising that the pregnancy rate is high in that population bracket?

What are the possible causes of high teenage pregnancy?

One is the menace of pornography whose first victims are the young.  The US Attorney General’s Commission on Pornography in 1986 found that the young,  primarily boys between 12 and 17 years of age, had a greater level of smut exposure than adults.  This is due to relaxed official policies and societal standards.  The Philippines is not far from this sad scenario.

Does not our level of morality mirror what Pope Francis calls the “culture of the ephemeral, where objects fancied must be purchased, possessed and consumed?”

Two, the huge lack of educational opportunities present the youth in economically disadvantaged areas with little positive learning opportunities.

Three, the weakness in our school curriculum does not challenge the intelligence nor harness the hormone levels of the youth.  The youth nationwide should be given much higher goals in Mathematics, Science, History, Literature and Grammar and Physical Education.  After school, there will be plenty of work here and in other interesting places in the world for them to develop further.

Last but not least, poverty due to bad governance.  Has change come?  Where are we now in regard to the Asian Development Bank report that for every 10 pesos our government spends, at the very least three pesos go to corruption?

LELLA M. DE JESUS, lellamdj@gmail.com