NEW DELHI, APRIL 19

India is on track to become the world's most populous nation as its young population soars, and will surpass China by mid-2023, according to data released by the United Nations on Wednesday.

The hope is that India's 254 million people aged between 15 and 24 - the largest number in the world - can help fuel economic growth for years to come. China, meanwhile, is struggling with an aging population and stagnant population growth, sparking expectations that the demographic changes could pave the way for India to become an economic and global heavyweight.

Tech giant Apple, among other companies, hopes to turn India into a potential manufacturing hub as it moves some production out of China, where wages are rising as the working age population shrinks.

The UN said in a report that India will have about 2.9 million people more than China sometime in the middle of this year. India will have an estimated 1.4286 billion people against mainland China's 1.4257 billion at that time, according to UN projections. Demographers say the limits of population data make it impossible to calculate an exact date.

China has had the world's largest population since at least 1950, the year the United Nations began issuing population data. Both China and India have more than 1.4 billion people, and combined they make up more than a third of the world's 8 billion people.

Not long ago, India wasn't expected to become the most populous until later this decade. But the timing has been sped up by a drop in China's fertility rate, with families having fewer children.

Today, China has an aging population with stagnant growth despite the government retreating from its one-child policy seven years ago.

In contrast, India has a much younger population, a higher fertility rate, and has seen a decrease in infant mortality over the last three decades. Still, the country's fertility rate has been steadily falling, from over five births per woman in 1960 to just over two in 2020, according to World Bank data.

Experts say India's growth could see an expanding labor force that can fuel growth in the country for decades to come. But they warn it could just as swiftly become a demographic liability if the growing number of young people in India are not adequately employed.

The report surveyed 1,007 Indians, 63% of whom said economic issues were their top concern when thinking about population change, followed by worries about the environment, health and human rights.

"The Indian survey findings suggest that population anxieties have seeped into large portions of the general public. Yet, population numbers should not trigger anxiety or create alarm," Andrea Wojnar, the United Nations Population Fund's representative for India, said in a statement. She added that they should be seen as a symbol of progress and development "if individual rights and choices are being upheld."

The hope is that India's soaring number of working age people will give it a "demographic dividend," or the potential for economic growth when a country's young, working age population is larger than its share of older people who are beyond their working years. That is what helped China become an economic and global heavyweight, even as its number of working age adults is now falling.

On Wednesday, China responded to news of the UN report, with Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin saying "a country's demographic dividend depends not only on quantity but also on quality."

"The population is important, so is talent... China's demographic dividend has not disappeared, the talent dividend is taking place and development momentum remains strong," Wang said at a briefing.