Madam, - Garret FitzGerald ( Opinion, March 3rd) notes the falling birth-rates in developed countries and suggests incentives to reverse this trend. This would be totally wrong, because falling populations in developed countries contrast with a gigantic explosion in the overall world population in recent years.
In Jesus's time the world population was about 300 million and by the year 1800 had grown to around one billion. By 1960 it had trebled to 3 billion people and then, incredibly, doubled to 6 billion by the year 2000. It is projected to reach 9 billion by 2040.
The planet simply cannot sustain such a population, particularly when all nine billion will understandably aspire to a "first-world" lifestyle. - Yours, etc,
DICK KEANE, Silchester Park, Glenageary, Co Dublin.