Contact: Larry Jacobs, World Congress of Families, 513-515-3685 cell, 815-964-5819, media@worldcongress.org

ROCKFORD, Ill., Nov. 10 /Christian Newswire/ -- Reacting to the news that America’s population has reached 300 million, World Congress of Families founder Dr. Allan Carlson commented: “We should celebrate more people, not bemoan population growth. With birth rates plummeting in the industrialized world, America’s population growth is a hopeful sign.”

In Europe as a whole, the fertility rate hovers at 1.3 births per woman. In Italy, it’s 1.2, in Russia 1.14 and in Spain 1.1.

In the United States, the fertility rate is 2.11 – right about at replacement level. U.S. population growth isn’t an immigration-driven phenomenon, as some pessimists suggest. The fertility rate for white native-born women is 1.85.

 If current trends continue, there will be 130 million Russians in 2015, compared to 148 million in 1992, when the Soviet Union collapsed. By mid-century, Russia is expected to lose a third of its 2000 population.

Russia is resource-rich, except for the most important resource – the people to exploit its natural resources.

Said Carlson, “Europe is engaged in a perilous experiment to determine if an advanced industrialized state can be maintained with decline birthrates, lavish social expenditures and fewer and fewer workers paying benefits to more and more retirees.”

Carlson wondered: “How can a declining population maintain a nation’s infrastructure? Who will man Europe’s factories, farms and armies? Who will pay the taxes for essential social services? A birth-dearth provides far more challenges than a population explosion.”

As for those who complain about congestion, pollution and overcrowding, Carlson noted that some of the most productive societies on earth have the highest population densities. “If you think America is overcrowded, fly over South Dakota, Wyoming, Iowa and Montana sometime. There’s plenty of room for our dynamic, growing population.”

“Confident societies expand. Those that are unable to find any purpose in existence, except living for the moment, contract. Right now, that’s the difference between the United States and Europe,” Carlson concluded.

World Congress of Families IV will be held in Warsaw, Poland – in the heart of Europe -- on May 11-13, 2007.  Of the 10 nations with the lowest birthrates, nine are in Europe.

One goal of the conference is to shift the public policy debate from “overpopulation” to “under-population” as the demographic challenge of the 21st. century.

For more information or to register for the World Congress of Families and the Warsaw Congress, visit www.worldcongress.org.  To schedule an interview with Dr. Carlson, contact Larry Jacobs at 1-800-461-3113 or email larry@worldcongress.org.

The World Congress of Families (WCF) is an international network of pro-family organizations, scholars, and leaders that seeks to restore the natural family as the fundamental social unit and the ‘seedbed’ of civil society.  The WCF (with its headquarters in Rockford, IL) was founded by Allan Carlson, president of The Howard Center, in 1997.  To date, there have been three World Congresses of Families – Prague (1997), Geneva (1999) and Mexico City (2004). WCF IV will be in Warsaw, Poland, May 11-13, 2007.