We have spoken before of this issue.
We I take it for granted mostly fear current growth and its long term effects.
And without doubt given the fact Australia is a very old continent and it lacks water and suitable soils we do not want over population.
When then do we stop? just here or world wide.
An article in this days SMH features section warned the cutting of the baby bonus may also cut growth.
There in its self is a mystery, we take growing numbers in AND pay for childbirth , so growth seems our target.
Yesterday, a world financial expert, no less went on record saying China may not become the economic Tiger we think it already is.
One child policy has in his words left an aging population and no workers to continue the growth.
India however has a much younger population and while far behind China now it will grow in both population and in the economy.
Growth, while we fear the population problems who of us, rural residents for sure, does not want a big W or K mart in town.
A factory with 100 new jobs out side of town.
The issue seems growth and the need for it to keep the economy on the go are wanted by far more than not.

Belly it certainly is a complex issue and one which brings with it strong emotions and it is almost impossible to have an intelligent conversation on the topic.

Population growth, however one determines the optimum size of a piece of land, can contribute to problems if not managed properly. The problem is the tendency to concentrate growth in already large cities. And failure of proper forward planning around infrastructure and lack of commitment to decentralisation.

Living in Canberra I have always wondered why more government services are not based in rural areas to help sustain those communities. There are some agencies (or parts of) located in rural areas like Albury and some other regional call centres. There are many more functions of public service that do not require ready access to parliament house that could operate just as efficiently in rural areas.

A high speed rail network (once mooted by John Howard) connecting cities, ports and towns would work positively in supporting rural towns.

Radical anti-population reduction policies such as the one-child policies in China (a disaster)verge into the Orwellian world with images of Big Brother and interference in personal choices.

However, the same applies in reverse. What governments can do is to stop paying people to have babies through over-generous baby bonuses, maternity leave, child care subsidies through notions like Costello's 'one for each parent and one for the country' rhetoric. There is something rotton if the economic framwork in which we exist does not support and foster the individuals/families ability to be self-supporting. While there is a high level of personal debt and focus on consumerism it will be difficult to reverse the trend.

It isn't simple, there are many interwoven complexities given the propensity for governments to push the economic growth paradigm over any other human or societal values, and sustainability is often a throw away line rather than a real commitment to environmental protection and population health.

It's not so much a question of population growth – as a question of the rate of growth.

The recent infographics on China from BBC News

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-20069627

help to put things into perspective.

If you look at the section on the Number of cities in China, Europe and US of 1 million people or more, and compare it with China's energy generation and economic cost to the environment data, the 'growth' to 221 cities of 1 million people or more by 2025 (and beyond) it is certain the Chinese are destined to live in interesting times.

No workers to continue the growth? Not for a while yet, by the look of it. Besides which Chinese companies could always set up factories in Africa.

If the only measures you have for an economy are based on 'growth' don't be surprised if everyone doesn't want more. Except of the costs – monetary, social, political and environmental – required to achieve the 'more'.

Still it would be nice to have something like the Thunderbirds' Tracy Island – paradisical beaches, scenery and a mansion (complete with servants) full of high-tech gadgets – with the rest of the world a short trip away and able after a visit to be left behind.

Complex? not descriptive enough.
The one child policy of China plus the habit of wanting a son but not daughters in India and near by country,s may well be a bigger problem that water shortages or food.
China already is aging, fast currently because of its policy young are far less in numbers than the aging.
India and some other country,s have far more boys than girls, basically because of cultural demands for Dowry's.
The west, developed west, is importing labour and skilled workers, just can not run their economy,s without them.
NO Australian party actually supports other than high growth in population and productivity.
It seems true, maybe unpalatable but still, the poorer the country the bigger the population problem.
Few of us,do not think the worlds population is big enough, maybe too big now.
In time this will confront us,but right now every country wants to develop.
Australia no less than any, refugees/Migrants/457 visa holders are part of that growth.

The problem is not population "growth". Planet Earth can sustainably support ten times the current world's population.

The problem is threefold:

(1) The way natural resources are misused, overused, underused and not used.

(2) The economic system of the world.

(3) Human intellectual biology ... we are a primitive, aggressive, territorial, warlike and competitive species (especially the male gender).

Our natural resources are continually mined, exploited and used without "real" thought regarding sustainability. This is because resources are directly linked to the economy/profit. This link needs to be forever broken, but that will never happen. Why? Because of our primitive intellectual biology which dictates that we put ourselves and our "immediate" needs ahead of the planet's needs.

This is why we are doomed as a species, unless we can eventually alter our intellectual biology. That will probably take many tens of thousands of years, and in the meantime we have to survive as a species (highly unlikely due to our animalistic nature and intellectual ability to destroy each other and the very planet we rely on).

We are a VERY recent species to occupy this planet. Within a hundred thousand years I suspect humans would have been long extinct. Our reign will not last long. We are not the superior species we "think" we are.

The decision has already been made for us.
Population growth rates are falling in developing countries.
As world GDP figures continue to fall, and you can see everywhere the
struggle with money printing and pixel money, we are rapidly
approaching the "End of Growth".

The world populations will realise sometime in the future that the
world cannot support 7 billion people at our standard of living.
Already the Egyptians are coming to that stark fact that their country
cannot support its present population. They got to their present level
as it was a significant oil producer and the government used the oil
income to subsidise the cost of food.
However Egyptian oil production peaked in about 2002 and they are now
a significant oil importer.
Their unemployment rate is still the same as it was before the Arab
spring revolution, but the general population still does not
understand why they cannot afford to eat.
The Nile can support about 20 million, but not the 80 million it
reached due to oil royalties.

Look at Egypt as a mini earth and there you see the worlds future.

Sustainability is not just a Buzz word, but a golden rule that you
break at your peril.