[3] Actual global human population growth amounts to around 70 million annually, or 0.85% per year.

The UN's estimates have decreased strongly in recent years due to sharp declines in global birth rates.

[9] Population growth alongside increased consumption is a driver of environmental concerns, such as biodiversity loss and climate change,[10][11] due to overexploitation of natural resources for human development.

[12] International policy focused on mitigating the impact of human population growth is concentrated in the Sustainable Development Goals which seeks to improve the standard of living globally while reducing the impact of society on the environment while advancing human well-being.

[citation needed] World population has been rising continuously since the end of the Black Death, around the year 1350.

[15][16] Due to its dramatic impact on the human ability to grow food, the Haber process, named after one of its inventors, the German chemist Fritz Haber, served as the "detonator of the population explosion", enabling the global population to increase from 1.6 billion in 1900 to 7.7 billion by November 2019.

[17] Some of the reasons for the "Modern Rise of Population"[18] were particularly investigated by the British health scientist Thomas McKeown (1912–1988).

[23] His work is pivotal for present day thinking about population growth, birth control, public health and medical care.

McKeown had a major influence on many population researchers, such as health economists and Nobel prize winners Robert W. Fogel (1993) and Angus Deaton (2015).

[28] Generally, developed nations have seen a decline in their growth rates in recent decades, though annual growth rates remain above 2% in some countries of the Middle East and Sub-Saharan Africa, and also in South Asia, Southeast Asia, and Latin America.

In Southern Africa, growth is slowing due to the high number of AIDS-related deaths.

[34] A 2014 study in Science concludes that the global population will reach 11 billion by 2100, with a 70% chance of continued growth into the 22nd century.

Vietnam, Mexico, Nigeria, Egypt, Ethiopia, and the DRC are witnessing a similar growth in population.