Editing IPCC:AR6/WGII/Chapter-16 (section)

==== 16.1.4.1 Demographics ====

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Population growth (or decline) can result in increasing (or decreasing) pressure on natural resources (e.g., soils, water and fish stocks) ( [[#IPBES--2019|IPBES, 2019]] ), and can result in the expansion of densely populated areas ( [[#Cardona--2012|Cardona et al., 2012]] ; [[#Day--2016|Day et al., 2016]] ). The majority of the population in the coming decades will be in urban areas. While urbanisation can have many benefits that reduce vulnerability, such as employment opportunities and increased income, better access to healthcare and education, and improved infrastructure, unsustainable urbanisation patterns can create challenges for resource availability, exacerbate pollution levels ( [[#Rode--2015|Rode et al., 2015]] ) and increase exposure to some risks. For example, ~10% of the global population live in low-elevation coastal zones (in 2000; areas &lt;10 m of elevation) ( [[#McGranahan--2007|McGranahan et al., 2007]] ; [[#Neumann--2015|Neumann et al., 2015]] ), which is expected to increase by 5% to 13.6% by 2100 depending on the population scenario ( [[#Neumann--2015|Neumann et al., 2015]] ; [[#Jones--2016|Jones and O’Neill, 2016]] ). Building assets and infrastructure in naturally risk-prone areas are also projected to increase ( [[#Magnan--2019|Magnan et al., 2019]] ), which may also lead to environmental degradation that can further aggravate risk, such as destruction of wetlands that buffer against floods ( [[#Schuerch--2018|Schuerch et al., 2018]] ; [[#Oppenheimer--2019|Oppenheimer et al., 2019]] ). Demographic trends, coupled with changes in income, can also result in increasing demands for land, food, water and energy, and therefore in major changes in land use and cover change (Arneth, 2019). The observed and projected population decline in some rural areas also has implications for vulnerability and exposure. In addition, demographic changes such as ageing may increase vulnerability to some climate hazards, including heat stress ( [[#Byers--2018|Byers et al., 2018]] ; [[#Rohat--2019a|Rohat et al., 2019a]] ; [[#Rohat--2019b|Rohat et al., 2019b]] ).

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