Demographic

Population evolution in different continents The vertical axis is logarithmic and is millions of people.

In the 20th century, the world saw the biggest increase in its population in human history due to lessening of the mortality rate in many countries due to medical advance and massive increase in agricultural productivity attributed to the Green Revolution
In year 2000, the United Nation estimated that the world's population was growing at the rate of 1.14% (or about 75 million people) per year, down from a peak of 88 million per year in 1989. In the last few centuries, the number of people living on Earth has increased many times over. By the year 2000, there were 10 times as many people on Earth as there were 300 years ago. According to data from the CIA's 2005–2006 World Factbook the world human population increased by 203,800 every day.The CIA Factbook increased this to 211,090 people every day in 2007, and again to 220,980 people every day in 2009.

Map of countries and territories by fertility rate
Globally, the population growth rate has been steadily declining from its peak of 2.19% in 1963, but growth remains high in Latin America, the Middle East and Sub-Saharan Africa.
In some countries there is negative population growth (i.e. net decrease in population over time), especially in Central and Eastern Europe (mainly due to low fertility rates) and Southern Africa (due to the high number of HIV-related deaths). Within the next decade, Japan and some countries in Western Europe are also expected to encounter negative population growth due to sub-replacement fertility rates.
In 2006, the United Nations stated that population growth is rapidly declining due to the demographic transition. The world population is expected to peak at 9.2 billion in 2050. However, this is only one of many estimates published by the UN. In 2009, UN projections for 2050 range from about 8 billion to 10.5 billion.