New blog on population geography research

Readers of the CSAP Blog might well be interested in a new blog focused on population matters being run by the Population Geography Research Group of the Royal Geographical Society. In the latest post I discuss the importance of variant population projections, especially given current political and economic uncertainty as the UK negotiates its exit from the European Union.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) recently released six extra variants for the 2016 based National Population Projections (NPPs) and I highlight substantial differences under three scenarios where the assumptions about future EU migration from mid-2019 onwards are varied. While these variants are not  classed as National Statistics, the projections to 2041 provide a useful guide to how sensitive the UK population is to EU migration. The difference between the highest and lowest projections is substantial, a difference of 4.2 million people over a 25 year period. This highlights that further work on testing the impact that international migration will have on the future population of the UK is needed. Current work by the NewETHPOP team is exploring these migration scenarios in further detail, so watch this space.

Author: Nik Lomax