This week’s Current Climate, which every Saturday brings you the latest news about the business of sustainability. Sign up to get it in your inbox every week.
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Earlier this week, the United Nations estimated that the world’s population hit 8 billion people. That’s just 11 years after the global population hit 7 billion. The Earth’s population hit 4 billion people in 1974–meaning it took less than 50 years for the population to double. That said, that rate of growth isn’t expected to continue. The U.N. estimates that the rate of growth has started to slow down, and is only expected to hit about 10.4 billion people by the end of the century. And that growth will be concentrated primarily in about 8 countries, while the rest of the world sees lower rates of childbirth coupled with aging populations. Thanks to advances in medicine, the proportion of the population aged…