The subject of population — like sex, politics, and religion — elicits such strong opinions that people often go out of their way to avoid talking about it. That’s led many to believe that population growth is no longer a valid concern, but if you’re worried about people, posterity, or the planet, it’s time to talk.

On Oct. 31, world population will cross the 7 billion mark. There’s nothing particularly significant about that number. It’s just a milestone, but it’s also an opportunity for reflection and recalibration.

A lot has happened since world population crossed the 6 billion mark in 1999. The world today is a much different place, and it has changed in ways that profoundly affect the human prospect. Soaring prices for energy and essential foodstuffs, along with climate change and water scarcity, are raising legitimate questions about the Earth’s ability to provide for an ever-expanding human population. The gains that we have made in reducing severe poverty, eliminating hunger, and improving health outcomes in the developing world may not be sustainable, unless more is done to empower women, educate girls, and expand the availability of contraceptives.

Twelve years ago, when world population reached 6 billion, the human prospect looked immeasurably brighter than it does today. Prices for energy and food were at or near historic lows. As a consequence, hunger and severe poverty were on the run. The world was already warming, but hopes were high that the nations of the world would soon act to reduce the level of greenhouse gas emissions and avert the worst effects of climate change. The global economy was booming, and it appeared that the U.S. and other donor nations would provide the foreign assistance that would be needed to accelerate human and economic development. And, while there was growing concern about humanity’s impact on the global environment, many believed that world population would start to decline by mid-century and that, long before then, advances in the use of renewable energy and green technologies would reduce humanity’s ecological footprint.

Read more on population. Check out our series 7 billion: What to expect when you’re expanding.But over the past 12 years, the trends have not gone according to script. Oil prices shot from a low of $13 a barrel in 1999 to $113 a barrel earlier this year, and they’re now hovering around $86. The prices of grains and other essential foodstuffs have more than doubled. Hunger and severe poverty have made a comeback. The fight against climate change has been nearly abandoned. The global economy has been battered. Economic development assistance has fallen short of expectations. Water scarcity and resource limitations have grown more acute. And the transition to a green economy has not been as swift as many hoped. In the meantime, world population keeps on growing with no end in sight. If fertility rates don’t continue to fall, population could soar as high as 15 billion by the end of this century.

There always have been compelling reasons for making family-planning services and reproductive-health services more widely available to women in the developing world. Access to contraceptives lowers maternal and infant mortality. It increases the chances that girls and boys will stay in school longer. It allows women to enter the workforce, and enables families to save and prosper. It improves reproductive health, and lowers the chances that family members will acquire HIV/AIDS. Similarly, there always have been strong arguments for investing more in girls, keeping them in school longer, and delaying the age of marriage. Female empowerment and gender equality have been, and remain, moral and social imperatives.

But, despite all the manifest benefits and the moral imperatives, the world has moved too slowly to fulfill the pledges made at the International Conference on Population and Development that was held in Cairo in 1994. And while the U.N.’s Millennium Development Goal 5(b) sets 2015 as the target year for achieving universal access to family planning and other reproductive-health services, that target is far from being met.

Logically, you might think the events of the past decade would have spurred a significant increase in global support for family planning and reproductive-health programs, but so far they have not. In the United States, Texas, New Jersey, and other states have slashed their support for family-planning clinics, and Congress is on the verge of cutting federal support for both domestic and international family planning. In the developing world, where fertility rates are highest, donor nation support for reproductive-health programs has fallen dramatically. It’s no wonder that birthrates are not falling as fast as previously projected, and that maternal and infant mortality has remained unacceptably high in the developing world.

The Population Institute has just released a report, “From 6 Billion to 7 Billion: How Population Growth Is Changing and Challenging Our World” [PDF], that examines the state of world population. It’s our hope that this report and the observance of the 7 billion population mark will generate a renewed commitment to family planning and the empowerment of women and girls. There’s a lot at stake. That’s why we are joining with other organizations in declaring that “It’s time to talk.”

The largest-ever generation of young people is now entering prime reproductive years. We owe it to them, and their posterity, to provide them with the reproductive health and rights that are rightfully theirs. The cost of doing so is minimal. Providing family-planning services to the 215 million women in developing countries who want to avoid a pregnancy, but who are not using a modern method of birth control, would cost less than $4 billion a year. Similarly, small investments in the education of girls in the developing world effectively delay marriage, lower fertility rates, and dramatically improve health and well-being.

Reducing projected population growth is a critical challenge, but it’s not an insurmountable one. It’s time to talk.

Don’t fear to be feared.

The gun lobby is not invincible, but it has won a disproportionate share of its battles. The NRA and its allies have not relied on data collection and scrupulously reasoned arguments to carry the day.  To the contrary, the gun lobby has focused on building and energizing its small membership base, working to influence the outcome of critical elections, and employing bare-knuckled tactics. 

The NRA’s membership is not that large — probably a little over 3 million.  Its views, even in today’s more pro-gun environment, are largely outside the mainstream of American thought.  Indeed, many of its own members likely disagree with the organization’s policies. But when the NRA speaks, the politicians in Washington listen, salute, and fall in line.

Ask any veteran of a gun-control battle, and they will tell you it’s not politics as taught in the classroom; it’s the political equivalent of hand-to-hand combat.

As climate activists regroup for another assault on the carbon camp, here are some key points to keep in mind:

Remember: all politics is politics.  It is not a debate competition. Elected officials must be persuaded by all means legal and ethical to vote for your position.  Some members of Congress may be won over by the urgency of your cause, but most will only be persuaded by the urgency with which their constituents speak out on this issue.  Sadly, loud voices at town halls count for more than all the scientists in the world.

Fight on all fronts.  Congress is just one battlefield in a much larger theater of political conflict involving 536 elections, including the election of the president.  If you are not fighting for the election of your friends and the defeat of your enemies at the ballot box, the battle for Congress is already lost. Your involvement in a campaign may or may not make a critical difference in the outcome of an election, but if your presence is not felt there, it will not be felt much in Congress either. 

Fight behind enemy lines.  Support on controversial issues tends to divide along party lines, but don’t let that stop you from recruiting and supporting a candidate on your issue who happens to be a member of the other party.  In fact, getting involved in primary fights on the other side of the political aisle may be the single most effective thing you can do to change the political dynamic.  Members of Congress will do almost anything — including voting for climate-change legislation — to avoid a serious primary challenge.  There’s a reason why the NRA’s political action committee, which generally backs Republican candidates, also devotes a lot of resources to unseating Democrats in primaries. Win or lose, it gets the attention of their opponents.

Win new allies.  Wars are seldom won without strong allies.  The same goes for politics.  If your allied base is not strong enough, convert some of your erstwhile opponents into allies.  The gun lobby suffered two of its worst defeats in the 1990s when gun-control groups successfully recruited the support of major national law-enforcement groups. Supporters of climate-change legislation need to work harder at making allies out of businesses interests that previously may have been skeptical of climate change, like the insurance industry. 

Redraw the battle lines.  At the present time, the issue of climate change is largely seen as an intergenerational issue affecting future generations, but as the effects of climate change become more pronounced, as they have this year, the issue may — and should — become more pressing to those focused on the “the here and now.”  Supporters of climate-change legislation need to do a better job of defining what’s at stake in the near term, including extreme temperatures, drought, flooding, and rising food prices. 

Work on your rallying cry.  It’s a shame that most issues in politics, even complex issues like climate change, are often reduced to 25 words or less, but that’s the way it is.  Messages serve to frame the debate and can mean the difference between victory and defeat. Both sides of the gun debate have used messaging to their benefit, but over the years the gun lobby has done a better job of it than gun-control proponents. Supporters of climate-change legislation need to go back to the message drawing board.

Change the rules of engagement.  When the rules don’t suit it, the gun lobby is not shy about changing them. Because it has a bigger political war chest than its gun-control opponents, it has taken every opportunity to loosen campaign finance restrictions.  Supporters of climate-change legislation need to reevaluate the laws and procedures, including the super-majority requirement in the Senate, that have made it more difficult to pass legislation and override entrenched business interests.  There’s a reason why the House has passed climate-change legislation and the Senate has not; the House is more (small “d”) democratic than the Senate. Unless the rules are changed, it may be difficult, if not impossible, to get climate-change legislation approved in the Senate.

Don’t fear to be feared.  Progressive groups, including many supporters of climate-change legislation, love to be loved.  The gun lobby doesn’t care if you don’t like it, so long as you fear it.  The NRA, the most powerful lobby in Washington, is one of the most reviled.  Many members of Congress, even pro-gun members, privately bristle at the tactics of the NRA, but that doesn’t stop them from voting in lockstep with the gun lobby.

Don’t get mad, get even.  Bruised, scarred, and brushed aside, no one could blame supporters of climate-change legislation for being angry at a political process that has stymied action on an issue of such great import.  When I worked on gun issues, I ran into a lot of activists, particularly the victims and survivors of gun violence, who were incensed at Congress for its failure to adopt sensible gun laws.  The key was to channel that anger and frustration into constructive action, and we did that with the passage of the Brady Law and the federal assault-weapons ban. 

The 111th Congress has failed to act on climate change. This is no time to quit.  The stakes are too high.  And success is the best revenge.

In the meantime, can’t we please give all women in the world the information and family-planning services they need to prevent unwanted and unintended pregnancies?  Is that too much to ask?  Or do we have to endlessly repeat the “population vs. consumption” debate?

There are already 6.8 billion of us …Photo courtesy James Cridland via Flickr

In Fred’s view, it’s very simple. Fertility rates have come down sharply over the past half century. Problem solved.

Sorry, Fred, saying that population growth is no longer a problem doesn’t make it so, no matter how many times you say it. Neither does wishful thinking.

While admitting that world population may increase by another 2 billion or so by midcentury, he dismisses this increment as a “time-lag” problem.

Earth to Fred: 2 billion more people is a lot of people to a world that is already struggling to feed 6.8 billion people. It’s a lot of people to a biosphere that is threatened with what leading biologists refer to as the Sixth Mass Extinction. And it’s a lot of people to a planet that is already threatened with the effects of climate change. And while “population momentum” (i.e., large numbers of people entering their reproductive years) may account for some of the projected increase in human numbers, much of it is being driven by the fact that fertility rates in many developing countries around the world are still well above the “replacement rate.”

Yes, Fred, we must do something about consumption. Unless we in the developed world do more to curb our consumption of fossil fuels and scarce minerals, the world is headed for an ecological and humanitarian disaster. We need to lower our per capita consumption of fossil fuels and other scarce resources. A lot. But I don’t see the G8 or the G20 putting their heads together right now in an effort to lower consumer spending. Really, I don’t. Neither do I see anything happening with respect to climate change.

And that’s why it’s especially important to prevent unwanted pregnancies in the U.S. and other developed nations. Sorry, Fred, it doesn’t matter that America’s fertility rate is right around the “replacement rate” or that Europe’s is well below it. A baby born here or elsewhere in the developed world will still consume a disproportionate share of the world’s resources and contribute disproportionately to the world’s environmental problems.

It’s also important to prevent unwanted pregnancies in the developing world. The reasons, however, are different. It really doesn’t matter whether global fertility rates have dropped sharply; they remain unsustainably high in many of the least developed areas of the world. Yes, Fred, fertility rates have come down sharply in Iran and Bangladesh, but women in Afghanistan and Somalia and other desperately poor countries are still having four, five, or six children on average. Some poor countries, like Uganda and Niger, are on track to triple their populations over the next 40 years. Africa’s population will likely double by mid-century.

Looking ahead, Fred, will these countries be able to feed themselves? Will they have enough safe drinking water? Will their lands be deforested or their rivers polluted? Will their maternal mortality rates and infant mortality rates remain unacceptably high? Will they be caught in a demographic poverty trap? Will they become failed states? If you have good answers to these questions, please let me know. Because if you don’t, then we need to ensure that women in these developing countries are given the information and the access to contraceptives that they need to prevent unwanted and unintended pregnancies.

Someday we will be able to declare victory. Someday every woman will have access to family-planning services and reproductive health care. Someday world population will be in decline. Someday world population levels will pose no danger to the health of the planet. But that day has not arrived. Not yet. In the meantime, your breezy dismissal of the “population problem” does an enormous disservice to the planet and every living creature that calls it home.

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Read more about population and the option of going childfree:

• The GINK manifesto: Say it loud: I’m childfree and I’m proud
• Childfree messages in Sex and the City 2 and Eat, Pray, Love
• Pundits criticize Elena Kagan for being childfree
• How green are the ‘childless by choice’?
• Women’s rights are the right way to approach the population issue
• Nearly a fifth of American women skip childbearing
• Want to join the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement?
• And still more about population