More people, fewer options
\n PESHAWAR
\nAs dusk settles over a small village in Nowshera, 25-year-old Shagufta Bibi lights an oil lamp in the corner of her modest home.
\nIts faint glow falls on schoolbooks spread before her children and on a faded photograph resting on a mud wall being the only picture she has of her late mother.
\nHer eyes fill with tears as she recalls the price her family paid for a deeply rooted desire about the birth of a son.
\n\u201cI have three sisters,\u201d Shagufta says quietly in Mohib Banda village. \u201cMy parents wanted a son. My mother died during her fifth pregnancy.\u201d Her voice trembles. \u201cThat desire took her life and deprived us of her love forever.\u201d
\nShagufta\u2019s story is not an isolated tragedy. It reflects a much larger, quieter problems unfolding across KP driven by unchecked population growth, entrenched cultural norms, and shrinking resources.
\nThe global population crossed 8.2 billion this year, according to the United Nations, and is projected to reach 8.5 billion by 2030, 9.7 billion by 2050, and 10.4 billion by the end of the century.
\nWhile medical advances have reduced mortality, they have also contributed to rapid population growth particularly in underdeveloped regions of South Asia, Central Asia, and sub-Saharan Africa.
\nPakistan stands among the most affected by this growing social phenomenon.
\nThe country\u2019s first census in 1951 recorded a population of 75 million. By 2017, that number had surged to nearly 208 million. If current trends continue, experts warned the population could reach 440 million by 2040.
\nWith an annual growth rate of 1.91 percent, Pakistan is now the fifth most populous country in the world and the second-largest Muslim-majority nation after Indonesia.
\n\u201cThis rapid growth is stretching every sector beyond capacity,\u201d says Prof. Dr. Zilakat Malik, former chairman of the Economics Department at the University of Peshawar. \u201cHospitals, schools, roads, agriculture, job markets everything is overstretched putting extra burden on society.\u201d
\nHe describes overpopulation as the \u201cmother of all socioeconomic ills,\u201d linking it directly to poverty, corruption, social injustice, unemployment, and increasing reliance on foreign loans compounded by the cultural preference for sons as heirs to property.
\nThe consequences are already visible in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa where devastating floods of 2022 and 2025 created problems did to deforestation and poverty.
\nThe World Bank estimated that 6 to 9 million Pakistanis could slip into poverty if climate change was not addressed.
\nToday, nearly 20 percent of the population such as around 55 million people live below the poverty line, with tribal and underdeveloped districts bearing the brunt.
\nIn Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, soaring prices of basic staples such as flour and sugar have deepened food insecurity.
\nHospitals across KP are overburdened due to lack of health units. Doctors report seeing up to 500 patients a day, a crushing workload exacerbated by poor maternal health and widespread malnutrition.
\nDr. Malik Riaz, Head of the Children\u2019s Department at Government Hospital Pabbi, says high fertility rates and inadequate birth spacing are directly responsible for alarming maternal and child mortality.
\n\u201cThirty to forty percent of children suffer from stunting,\u201d he explains. \u201cThis is largely due to poor maternal nutrition and lack of awareness. Much of it is preventable with proper reproductive health services and access to contraceptives.\u201d
\nHe warns that the first six months of a child\u2019s life crucial for physical and cognitive development are often neglected because lactating mothers themselves are malnourished and exhausted.
\nRecognizing the scale of the crisis, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Population Welfare Department has approved its first provincial population policy. The plan aims to raise contraceptive prevalence and reduce fertility rates from 3.9 to 2.1 births per woman.
\nAccording to a department spokesperson, the government plans to establish 260 Family Welfare Centers, mobile service units in remote districts, and adolescent reproductive health centers across the province.
\n\u201cSocial taboos, poverty, early marriages, and the obsession with male children continue to undermine economic progress,\u201d the spokesperson said.
\nTo counter these challenges, psychologists have been deployed in schools and colleges across 14 districts, while 3,500 religious scholars engaged to spread awareness at the grassroots level.
\nIn the merged tribal districts, 120 new family planning centers have been approved, alongside expanded mobile services for communities previously cut off from reproductive healthcare.
\nExperts agree that clinical reforms and policies alone are not enough.
\n\u201cThis is a collective problem,\u201d says Prof. Zilakat. \u201cUnless political leadership, civil society, media, and religious leaders act together, the situation will not improve.\u201d
\nPakistan, an agriculture-based economy, produces only 20 percent of its edible requirements, importing food worth nearly $4 billion annually. With population growth outpacing economic expansion, the burden is becoming unsustainable.
\nEconomists advocate austerity measures, reduced luxury imports, energy conservation, and most critically greater investment in education and healthcare, particularly for women.
\n\u201cBut beyond policies, we must change mindsets,\u201d Prof. Zilakat stresses. \u201cPopulation control is not a western agenda. It is a survival strategy.\u201d
\nBack in Mohib Banda, Shagudfta Bibi watches her children study under the dim light, determined to give them a different future.
\n\u201cI wish people understood the cost of this race for sons,\u201d she says, her voice barely audible. \u201cWe lost our mother. No child should have to grow up like that.\u201d
\nFor families like hers and for a nation standing at a demographic crossroads of climate change the silent emergency of population explosion is no longer distant. It is already shaping lives, futures, and the fate of generations to come.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
More people, fewer options PESHAWAR As dusk settles over a small village in Nowshera, 25-year-old Shagufta Bibi lights an oil lamp in the corner of her modest home. Its faint glow falls on schoolbooks spread before her children and on a faded photograph resting on a mud wall being the only picture she has of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-527654","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-peshawar"},"yoast_head":"\n