THE world's Muslim population will grow twice as fast as the non-Muslim population in the next 20 years, when Muslims are expected to make up more than a quarter of the global population, a study predicts.
Using fertility, mortality and migration rates, researchers at the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life project a 1.5-per cent annual population growth rate for the world's Muslims over the next two decades, and just 0.7 per cent growth each year for non-Muslims.
The study, called The Future of the Global Muslim Population, projects that in 2030 Muslims will make up 26.4 per cent of the world's population, which is expected to total around 8.3 billion people by then.
That marks a three-percentage-point rise from the 23 per cent share held by Muslims of the globe's estimated 6.9 billion people today, the study says.
More than six in 10 followers of Islam will live in the Asia-Pacific region in 2030, and nuclear Pakistan, which has seen a rise in radical Islam in recent months, will overtake Indonesia as the world's most populous Muslim nation. Read more.
Using fertility, mortality and migration rates, researchers at the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life project a 1.5-per cent annual population growth rate for the world's Muslims over the next two decades, and just 0.7 per cent growth each year for non-Muslims.
The study, called The Future of the Global Muslim Population, projects that in 2030 Muslims will make up 26.4 per cent of the world's population, which is expected to total around 8.3 billion people by then.
That marks a three-percentage-point rise from the 23 per cent share held by Muslims of the globe's estimated 6.9 billion people today, the study says.
More than six in 10 followers of Islam will live in the Asia-Pacific region in 2030, and nuclear Pakistan, which has seen a rise in radical Islam in recent months, will overtake Indonesia as the world's most populous Muslim nation. Read more.