Top Five Trends in Population

Delivery

This report comes in PPT.

Key Findings

Growth from fewer, older consumers

Population decline is moving from forecast to operating reality across much of East Asia and Eastern Europe, with China and Japan among the biggest markets set to shrink by 2040. As new consumers become scarcer in these markets, growth depends less on acquisition and more on retaining value, serving older cohorts and lifting productivity.

Scale is concentrating fast

Future population growth will be concentrated in a small group of young markets, led by India, with sub-Saharan Africa supplying most of the gain. Headcount, though, runs ahead of income, so early, affordable entry and distribution will secure tomorrow’s consumers before their spending power arrives.

Migration becomes the mainstream

In many mature economies, net migration now supplies most or all of population growth. Its commercial weight runs beyond labour: migrants and their children are moving multicultural demand into the mainstream across food, retail, media and finance. Policy is, however, tightening, making volatility the central planning problem.

Growing old before growing rich

In ageing economies, the working-age population is shrinking while dependency climbs, tightening labour supply and demand together. The strain is sharpest where countries grow old before they grow rich, as China does at around a third of Japan’s income, or Thailand at even less. Growth then rests on automation, productivity and older workers.

The most mature cohorts skew female

Later life is increasingly female: women will form the majority of the world’s over-65s by 2040. Their spending power lags, at roughly two thirds of men’s per head, and varies widely by market. Later-life demand will be shaped by women’s health, financial resilience and independence, not chronological age alone.