KARACHI, April 7: The present rate of population growth is giving rise to a number of socio-economic problems especially when our resources are not increasing accordingly.

This was stated by Samina Brohi, a demography specialist, at a seminar on ‘Population and development’ here on Friday. The two-day moot is being organized by Karachi University Sociology Department in collaboration with the Population Welfare Department.

Samina Brohi said that area wise Pakistan formed 0.6 per cent of the planet whereas its share in the world’s population is 2.32 per cent.

She pointed out that every year a population equivalent to that of the city of Faisalabad and Sialkot was added in the country. She was of the view that if the population growth continued with the present ratio the country’s population would be doubled in the next 35 years.

Fateh Mohammad Burfat of sociology department said that in the year 1901 the population of the area which was now Pakistan was only 17 million, which increased to 32 million in 1947. The present population was around 153 million, he added. It was pointed out that from the years 1901 to 1950 it took 50 years to double but in the next five decades there was an increase of 118 million in the population.—APP