Band 9 model answer

The global population, which has more than doubled since the 1960s, places growing demands on freshwater, arable land, fossil fuels and atmospheric capacity. Understanding why this pressure is intensifying and identifying the most effective responses is essential for ensuring a sustainable future.

Population growth is highest in regions where access to family planning services is limited and where women have restricted access to education and economic opportunity. Research consistently shows that as female literacy and labour-force participation rise, birth rates fall, because educated women marry later, have greater autonomy over reproductive decisions and tend to have fewer but better-provided-for children. Poverty itself reinforces high fertility in many contexts, as large families serve as economic and social security in the absence of pension systems and public services. Alongside population growth, rising consumption in middle- and high-income countries multiplies environmental pressure per capita: an average resident of a wealthy nation consumes many times the natural resources of someone in a low-income country, meaning that consumption patterns are at least as important as headcount in explaining resource depletion.

Solutions therefore need to address both dimensions. Expanding access to reproductive health education and voluntary family planning services in high-fertility regions is among the most cost-effective environmental interventions available, while simultaneously advancing gender equality, a benefit valuable far beyond its demographic effects. Investing in girls' education and women's economic empowerment has been shown in countries such as Bangladesh and Ethiopia to produce rapid, voluntary reductions in fertility within a generation. On the consumption side, transitioning energy systems away from fossil fuels, improving the efficiency of food production and adopting circular economy principles that reduce waste and material throughput are essential to decouple economic development from environmental damage.

Addressing overpopulation and overconsumption simultaneously, through empowerment rather than coercion, offers the most ethically sound and practically durable path to a population that the planet can sustain.