What are the major population clusters in the world
China
Eastern China
Southern China
China – a huge population cluster in just about every respect. China is connected to both North Asia and Southeast Asia. In addition to having a coast on the Yellow Sea, the Bohai Sea and East China Sea (see map), China shares land borders with India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Mongolia, and Russia. China also shares a border with Korea in the northeast, the borders of the mountains with Mongolia and Afghanistan in the west, and the Tibetan Plateau in the northeast. This geophysical richness is no coincidence.
The 4,138,333,000 population in China is further divided into 11 provinces, 2 autonomous regions, and 2 directly administered municipalities with a combined population of 506,570,000.
The three largest population clusters in the world are the regions of eastern China, south Asia, and Europe.
In Southeast Asia, there is a city cluster with the largest population density, Bangkok, Thailand. Bangkok is the capital and financial center of Thailand. The city is also a vibrant destination for people wishing to escape the country’s huge heat and humidity. The population of the city, nearly 8 million people, is concentrated on the city’s narrow grid pattern, which is itself a cluster of city blocks.
Bangkok is surrounded by a population cluster of more than half a million people on the banks of the Chao Phraya River. This concentration results in highly concentrated living quarters.
But Bangkok isn’t the only dense region in the region. Another major population center is Chiang Mai, which is a traditional center for Ayurvedic medicine.
Southeast Asia also has large population clusters.
Some of these “clusters” show unusual patterns. India’s population shows a fluctuating pattern. Large in 1950, it shrank during the century until the early 1990s when it began to rebound. Within a decade it has expanded, and now holds the largest concentration of human population on Earth. India has the world’s second largest population.
India’s population shows a fluctuating pattern. Large in 1950, it shrank during the century until the early 1990s when it began to rebound. Within a decade it has expanded, and now holds the largest concentration of human population on Earth. India has the world’s second largest population. China’s population is predicted to climb to 1.9 billion by 2050, based on current projections of human population growth.
Additional large population centers exist in various countries with high urbanization.
There are 26 major population clusters in the world. South Asia accounts for 28% of the world’s population. When you add in the Pacific Ocean, the population of this large geographic area rises to 33%. In comparison, Eastern North America is around 12% of the world’s population but contains the United States, Canada, Mexico, and Puerto Rico. Eastern Europe comes in at 12% of the world’s population, the US is around 10%, and East Asia is around 8%.
Eastern North America is the only major population area where the large concentration centers are not geographically located on either side of the US-Canadian border, although there are a number of population areas that do surround the US.
All in all, today the top 16 countries in the world contain more than half of the world’s people.
South Asia has just become the world’s largest population cluster, overtaking East Asia in 2010.
Eastern North America has three concentrations: Eastern North America and the Caribbean is the most populated area, followed by Eastern North America and Canada and Mexico. A fourth major concentration occurs in parts of the Middle East that have a history of close ties to the United States.
In Western Europe the United Kingdom has become the area with the highest concentration of people. Europe is a rich concentration of concentrated population, and now is home to nearly half the world’s population. But it is the United States, the Caribbean, Mexico and Canada that account for two-thirds of the global population.
Second ranked, lies centered on China and includes the Pacific-facing Asian coastal zone from the Korean Peninsula to Vietnam.
Eastern North America contains a substantial cluster of western coast of the continent from northern British Columbia to northern Alaska. The largest concentration of humans is in the Great Lakes and along the Canada-U.S. border. North America also has a significant cluster of population in the Eastern U.S.
The largest concentration of people in Eastern North America is in the Great Lakes and along the Canada-U.S. border.
Europe also has a large population cluster in Central Europe, centered in Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia.
Finally, China has a very large population cluster. The urbanized region in the east is especially dense. However, China also has many dense rural regions within the country.
East Asia, South Asia, Europe and Eastern North America contain the four major concentrations of population.
The Population of the Four Corridors of the World-East Asia, South Asia, Europe, and Eastern North America
East Asia: Sino-Asian Population Flows Converge
As with South Asia, East Asia is the home to four major clusters of population, including China and neighboring populations. The other two clusters are Japan and Korea.
In this image of China, we can see that most of the land mass is surrounded by major population clusters in various countries, which are a result of people from different regions crossing boundaries to share their cultural heritage, language, cuisine and education.
If we
perform a clustering analysis (thus, clustering) of the world population based on the population density of each area, then different clusters become apparent. We can also identify specific areas within each cluster that have a higher or lower population density.
As can be seen, these main clusters have higher population density than other areas of the world.
It is important to note that these are not stable population densities. The populations are constantly shifting between these densities. In most cases, these shifts are small. However, there are some movements of large populations from one area to another.
The Chinese and Japanese centers of population are declining due to low fertility rates and an aging population.