The United Nations Commission for Population & Development says that the world population is steadily increasing placing growing strains on limited resources such as water in the developing world. The world's current population figure of 6.1 billion people will increase to 9.3 billion by the middle of this century.

The UN Commission for Population and Development in one of its latest reports, points out that 6 countries are responsible for half of the annual world population growth. They are: India, China, Pakistan, Nigeria, Bangladesh and Indonesia.

Some 90 per cent of all the world's people would live in the developing countries by the year 2050 compared to 80 per cent at present, the report says.

India would record the biggest increase with about 100 million more people, than at present and a population of 1.6 billion people by the year 2050. This would be more than China which would then have 1.5 billion people.

Despite the belief that the AIDS epidemic would halt or reduce the population in Africa the report estimates that Africa's population would grow from the current 794 million people to 2 billion people by 2050.

However, several industrial nations notably Japan and Germany would see a steady decline of their populations. Germany's population would fall by 14 per cent until the year 2050. The estimates do not include population migrations but it is clear that international immigration patterns in the 21st century will lead to greater ethnic and cultural diversity in the industrial nations, the report says.

The United States, a classical immigration country would have 80 million more people than today, largely due to immigration, the report predicts. Pressure on the earths resources would increase markedly. Already a third of the worlds people live in countries with acute water shortage, the UN Population Commission warns.