London: The number of mobile phone subscriptions are set to outnumber the world's population by the end of 2014, a United Nations agency report has said. According to the International Telecoms Union's (ITU) prediction, mobile phone subscriptions will pass a whopping seven billion early in 2014.
Currently, there are 6.8 billion mobile phone subscriptions while the world's population is 7.1 billion. More than a third of the global population are online, the ITU World in 2013 report also found. The Commonwealth of Independent States, the alliance of countries formerly in the Soviet Union, is believed to have the highest mobile penetration with 1.7 subscriptions for every person, the report said. Africa has the least, with 63 subscriptions per 100 people, it said.
"Every day we are moving closer to having almost as many mobile cellular subscriptions as people on Earth," said Brahima Sanou, director of the ITU Telecommunication Development Bureau. "The mobile revolution is 'm-powering' people in developing countries by delivering ICT applications in education, health, government, banking, environment and business," Sanou said.
The report also found that 2.7 billion people, almost 40 per cent of the world's population, are online. Europe has the highest penetration (75 per cent), followed by the Americas (61 per cent). Asia has 32 per cent of its population online and Africa 16 per cent....
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08:03 PM, May 12, 2013
New Delhi: President Pranab Mukherjee on Monday said efficient water management is crucial to keep pace with population growth and economic development. "Available water must be managed judiciously to meet the twin burden of population growth and economic development. Conservation, balanced distribution and reclamation of used water are essential cogs in the wheel of water management," Mukherjee said while inaugurating the India Water Week 2013 with the theme 'Efficient Water...
06:04 AM, Apr 09, 2013
The high population growth rate in Bihar is a matter of concern and if it continues, it will double by 2051 and erode economic growth, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar said on Saturday. "If the population growth rate continues in the years to come, our population will double by 2051 and put insurmountable pressure on infrastructure, resources and land in particular that cannot be stretched to accommodate the growing number of...
05:33 PM, Mar 02, 2013
What we feared has come true. Pathological reports have confirmed that the four-year-old tiger that died in Nagarhole Tiger Reserve two weeks ago (January 13) was a victim of rat poison. According to R Gokul, Director, Nagarhole Tiger Reserve pathological reports have confirmed that zinc phosphide was found in the viscera of the tiger. ...
04:33 PM, Jan 29, 2013
China has shot down speculations that country's new leadership may ease up on the controversial one-child policy, asserting that it would continue adhering to the coercive family planning measure. China's family planning policy should be unswervingly adhered to, Wang Xia, director of the National Population and Family Planning Committee, told a conference, state-run Xinhua news agency reported. ...
01:15 PM, Jan 15, 2013
Despite the Delhi High Court's order directing the government to build one shelter per one lakh population, the capital still has only 150 temporary and permanent shelters that can house a mere 7500 homeless people of the city. With over three lakh homeless people in Delhi, the existing shelters are not only inadequate, they are also in poor conditions. ...
09:28 AM, Jan 05, 2013
Tiger population in India has significantly increased in the wild, thanks to protection of additional habitat of the big cat and stringent anti-poaching patrols, the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) said. In southwestern India, where WCS research and conservation efforts began 25 years ago, a major rebound of tigers in the Western Ghats region of Karnataka has taken place. ...
04:59 PM, Dec 27, 2012
Washington: The percentage of Indians with good jobs is up from where it was two years ago but it provides little strong evidence that India's sluggish economy is firmly on the mend, according to a new survey. About one in four Indian adults (26 per cent) were employed full time for an employer in the first half of 2012, according to Gallup's new Payroll to Population metric released on Wednesday....
10:27 AM, Oct 25, 2012
Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi said Muslims are outnumbering Hindus in Assam not because of the increase in illegal migration from Bangladesh but because Muslims are illiterate and bear more children. Speaking to Karan Thapar on Devil's Advocate, the Chief Minister took full responsibility for the communal riots and said that there were multiple reasons behind it. Here is an excerpt from the interview: Speaking on Devil's Advocate with Karan...
11:07 PM, Sep 09, 2012
New Delhi: The Chairman of the National Commission for Minorities (NCM), Wajahat Habibullah on Sunday took on Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi for his remarks against Muslims in the state in an interview. Gogoi, in an interview to Karan Thapar on Devil's Advocate, blamed illiteracy amongst Muslims for their population growth. Saying that the reason for the growth of Muslim population in the state was more local than external, the...
10:51 AM, Sep 09, 2012
Hyderabad: Even as Telugu Desam Party (TDP) chief N Chandrababu Naidu and YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) honorary president Vijayamma are vying with each other to win the hearts of BCs with promises of allotting more seats in the 2014 polls, PCC president Botcha Satyanarayana mooted a new proposal of allotting seats to each caste across the state in proportion to their population for the general elections. Botcha demanded Naidu and...
12:51 PM, Aug 29, 2012
Indore: Blaming the Centre for the violence in Assam and the subsequent exodus of Northeast Indians from various parts of the country to their home states, the BJP on Sunday said the "vote-bank" politics of Congress was "weakening" the country. "Illegal Bangladeshi immigrants are crossing over to India in large numbers. At the same time, the people from northeast settled in various parts of the country for employment have to...
09:43 PM, Aug 19, 2012
Guwahati: Two Bodo groups including the National Democratic Front of Bodoland's (NDFB) pro-talk faction on Saturday demanded that the Assam government verify the citizenship status of the Bengali-speaking Muslims, displaced during last month's clashes, before rehabilitating them. The pro-talk faction of the NDFB, also known as NDFB (Progressive) and People's Joint Action Committee for Bodoland Movement - a conglomeration of several Bodo and non-Bodo organisations in the Bodoland Territorial Areas...
09:09 AM, Aug 19, 2012
Thiruvanathapuram: Kerala is heading for a significant phase in its demographic transition with the state moving towards achieving zero population growth rate, which will result in an increase in scarcity of labour. With a very low fertility rate and stabilising death rate, Kerala is expected to achieve zero population growth rate in 25 to 30 years, a stage indicating the incipient decline of the population, according to the State Urbanisation...
10:50 AM, Aug 10, 2012
Bangalore: Close to half the households in urban areas in the state live in rented houses, revealed the latest census data released by Karnatakas directorate of census operations. Of the total 53.15 lakh households in the urban areas, 27.13 lakh people live in rented accommodation. Also, of these total households, 15 per cent still do not have latrine within the premises and 12 per cent do not have drainage while...
03:02 PM, Jul 26, 2012
New Delhi: The significance of the World Population Day, observed on July 11 every year, lies in the fact that the world holds 7,025,071,966 people as on July 9, 2012, a leap of over 2.5 times over the last fifty years, while earth's resources remain finite. A huge number of people, running into billions, suffer from abject poverty, starvation, malnutrition, diseases, illiteracy, lack of access to healthcare, wars and all...
09:53 AM, Jul 11, 2012
The World Population Day is observed on July 11 every year to raise the awareness of people about global population issues. In 1989, in its decision 89/46, the Governing Council of the United Nations Development Programme recommended that, in order to focus attention on the urgency and importance of population issues in the context of overall development plans and programmes and the need to find solutions for these issues, 11...
08:46 AM, Jul 10, 2012
United Nations: India and China will witness the largest growth in their urban populations in the next four decades, posing new challenges of providing jobs, housing, energy and infrastructure to their people, the United Nations said. The UN's '2011 Revision of the World Urbanisation Prospects' said Africa and Asia will lead the global urban population growth in the next four decades with the largest increases expected in India, China, Nigeria,...
08:46 AM, Apr 07, 2012
New Delhi: At a time when police-population ratio is abnormally low, 16,800 VIPs across the country had more than 50,000 security personnel to guard them, nearly double the actually allotted strength. According to a Home Ministry report, 50,059 policemen were deployed in 25 states and Union Territories in 2010 to provide security to 16,788 VIPs, which included ministers, MPs, MLAs, judges and bureaucrats, for more than six months. Interestingly, only...
09:33 AM, Apr 01, 2012
New Delhi: India has an estimated 25 lakh gay population and about seven per cent (1.75 lakh) of them are HIV infected, Government told the Supreme Court on Tuesday. "The population of MSM was estimated to be 25 lakhs in India," the governemnt said in its affidavit filed in the apex court, citing figures of the National Aids Control programme. The affidavit, filed by Ministry of health, said that it...
01:43 AM, Mar 14, 2012
