The world’s seven billionth person will be born sometime this year – a birth that is “an opportunity to celebrate our common humanity and our diversity,” according to the secretary-general of the United Nations.
In a statement to mark World Population Day on 11 July, Ban Ki-moon said: “It is also a reminder of our shared responsibility to care for each other and our planet.
“Reaching a global population of seven billion is a numerical landmark, but our focus should always be on people.”
Ban said that because of this, he is excited that the UN Population Fund is launching a new campaign for ‘7 Billion Actions’ aimed at getting people to “make a difference by uniting together through social networks and working for change”.
Doing so is not an insurmountable task, he added, based on recent positive developments in the Arab world.
“We have seen many examples this year of the immense power of people to embrace hope over despair, to seek fair treatment where they are suffering discrimination, and to demand justice over tyranny.”
Ban added: “They are aspiring to attain universal rights that the United Nations proudly upholds and relentlessly works to realise.”
The anticipated birth, he said, poses more challenges for the world, especially in the area of eradicating inequality. But he noted that such challenges could easily be overcome if the peoples of the world were to unite and speak with one voice.
“When we act on our shared values, we contribute to our common future. Ending poverty and inequality unleashes vast human potential.
“Promoting the Millennium Development Goals fosters prosperity and peace. And protecting our planet safeguards the natural resources that sustain us all,” he said.
n Meanwhile, preliminary figures from Ireland’s 2011 Census shows the total population on 10 April was 4,581,269, an increase of 341,421 on the 2006 census.
The figure represents an increase of 8.1 per cent over the past five years, or an annual average of 1.6 per cent, compared to 2.0 per cent per annum in the period 2002-2006.
In a statement, CSO statistician Shaun McLaughlin said: “These early results are based on the summary counts for each enumeration area which were compiled by the 4,854 enumerators.”
“The enumerators did a great job getting their summaries back to us, which allows us to prepare these early results of the census. We’d like to thank the entire census field staff for all their hard work and perseverance over the course of the census field campaign.”
