ASEAN Population

Abstract

The total population of the ASEAN nations in 1985 was 287 million. This population had grown from 161 million in 1960, or by 78 per cent over this period of a quarter century. A rapid decline in mortality beginning in the late 1940s and, in some countries, a rise in fertility, led to an acceleration of population growth in the 1950s and 1960s. It is not surprising, therefore, that in the 1960s concern was building up throughout the region about the rapid rates of population growth, and that by 1970 all of the ASEAN countries (except Brunei) had adopted policies to reduce this rate of population growth. The introduction of these policies coincided with the beginnings of a downturn in the rates of population growth, occasioned by a fertility decline which resulted in birth rates declining faster than the ongoing decline in death rates. The extent to which the policies and programme resulting from them were responsible for this fertility decline will be discussed later.