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17winter 2014/2015 + optionswww.iiasa.ac.at Population, climate change, and sustainable  development Having such a detailed view of future population and relevant characteristics lends itself to application in today’s ever more complex and interconnected research, and the projections were designed with this in mind: They form the “human core” of the next generation of climate scenarios, known as the Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs), which will likely play a key role in future global change analysis including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The medium population and human capital projection, considered the most likely, corresponds to the middle-of-the road SSP (SSP2), which assumes that many aspects of the world will continue along their current trajectory. The other four SSPs represent various possible future paths, depending on different assumptions about future changes in education, economic growth, and other factors that can influence population growth. IIASA researcher Samir KC worked closely with the population side of the SSP development. He says, “Past climate scenarios only used total population size. Now, the representation of population as a driver is much richer by having the full age, sex, and education distributions.” Different scenarios based on these distributions can make a big difference to future economic growth and technology and in fields related to climate change, including energy and food demand. A treasure trove for research The data are now freely available for download via an online data exploration portal (see box), and researchers have already begun using them to enrich their understanding of natural disaster vulnerability, impacts of aging populations, and more. For example, one major research project at IIASA has examined the links between education and vulnerability to natural disasters. The research, now published in a special issue of the journal Ecology and Society, showed that female education is strongly associated with lower levels of disaster fatalities around the world, both in developing and developed countries. Researchers found a correlation across 167 countries for which data were available, and have also conducted detailed case studies in specific countries and regions, including Nepal, Thailand, and the Caribbean. In each case, the researchers found a strong link between education and lower fatality rates in the case of natural disasters—from hurricanes to landslides— which could not be explained by differences in income or national GDP. Lutz and colleagues have also drawn on the new projections in a re-examination of what should be seen as desirable fertility levels. In many developed countries, birth  rates have been declining to what are now well below replacement rate, or  two children per woman. The new projections assume that fertility trends are unlikely to rebound to replacement level in the foreseeable future. Is  this a problem? In a recent study in the journal Demographic Research, the  researchers found that it may in fact be a positive. “People have this idea that replacement level fertility is the ideal,” says Lutz. “But like other questions, when we factor in education, the picture looks quite different.” A  more educated workforce tends to be more productive and healthier, according to the study, which means that even with fewer people of working age, the economy does not have to go into decline and that there are more resources per child to invest in human capital formation. KL Further info Lutz W, Butz WP, KC S (Eds) (2014). World Population & Human Capital in the 21st Century. Oxford University Press. § Lutz W, Butz WP, KC S (Eds) (2014). World  Population & Human Capital in the 21st Century. Executive Summary, IIASA. § Butz WP, Lutz W, Sendzimir J (Eds) (2014). Special Feature, “Education and Differential Vulnerability to Natural Disasters.” Ecology and Society [www.ecologyandsociety.org/issues/view.php?sf=73]. § KC S, Lutz  W. The  human core of the shared socioeconomic pathways: Population scenarios by age, sex and level of education for all countries to 2100. Global Environmental Change (Published online 4 July 2014) [doi:10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2014.06.004]. § Striessnig E, Lutz  W (2014). How does education change the relationship between fertility and age-dependency under environmental constraints? A long-term simulation exercise. Demographic Research 30(16):465–492 [doi:10.4054/DemRes.2014.30.16]. Project Adaptive Capacity to Climate Change: www.iiasa.ac.at/futuresoc Data Wittgenstein Centre Data Explorer: www.wittgensteincentre.org/dataexplorer Wolfgang Lutz lutz@iiasa.ac.at § Sergei  Scherbov scherbov@iiasa.ac.at § Samir  KC kc@iiasa.ac.at § Anne  Goujon goujon@iiasa.ac.at Data Explorer IIASA’s population projections have always been freely available for anyone to use. But with so much data on assumptions and results now available for 195 countries, by education level, age, and sex for sets of scenarios until 2100, the newly released population projections reach into the realm of big data—far too much information to be easily explored in a spreadsheet. So along with the book, IIASA researchers for the first time released the data via the online Wittgenstein Centre Data Explorer, which allows people to delve into the details and pick out the countries or world regions, and indicators about assumptions and results that they are specifically interested in, at any level of detail regarding age, sex, and education categories. The  data can be viewed online in maps, graphs, or tables, or easily exported for additional use. “The initial version is still aimed at scientists, but we hope to make these data useable for policymakers, journalists and the general public soon,” says IIASA researcher Anne  Goujon, who led the Wittgenstein Centre Data Explorer development. +  No Education  Primary  Secondary  Post Secondary 21002030 2040 2050 2060 2070 2080 20902020 World Population  Post Secondary 2400018000120006000 Female Female 2400018000120006000 The medium, or most likely, scenario in IIASA’s new population projections show world population peaking by around 2070 and then declining to approximately 9 billion (top). The new population projections explicitly include education, which is one factor that leads to lower fertility rates and lower projections by IIASA compared to the United Nations. In the case of Nigeria, IIASA projections also consider recent advances in the country in women’s education. Since more educated women consistently have fewer children, they project that future fertility will decline. The pyramids (left) show the projected population of Nigeria by age, sex, and education level for 2010 and 2050.