To answer precisely a question how many people live on Earth now, it is impossible as a large number of earthlings is born and dies every minute. Thus, the population of the planet constantly changes. However it is possible to call approximate number.
Population of Earth today
Now the population of the planet is more than seven billion people. According to statistical data of the American CIA, in July, 2013 the number of people on Earth was about 7,095,217,980 people. The UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon at the 47th session of the Commission of the UN on the population and development at the beginning of 2014 said in the report that the population made 7.2 billion people.
According to the estimates of experts, delay of growth rates of the population of the planet is observed now.
As there is a calculation
To define how many people live on Earth, it is necessary to define their quantity in certain regions and the countries of the planet. In many countries, general population censuses with a certain frequency - time in five, ten years, etc. are for this purpose conducted. But there are also countries where censuses were conducted long ago, or were not carried out at all. Therefore for determination of total population in the world special calculations are used.
Dynamics
Not one millennium the number of people of Earth was rather small and increased slowly. Gradually growth of the population accelerated, and in the 20th century its rates became especially rough. On average on the planet every day becomes on 250 thousand people more. At the beginning of our era the population of the planet did not exceed 300 million people. This figure increased twice only by the 17th century. Infinite wars, epidemics considerably slowed down demographic increase in population. Increase in production, the industries promoted increase in the population - at the beginning of the 19th century it was already one billion. By 30th years of the 20th century this one billion doubled, and in 30 years - trebled. As of October 12, 1999 on Earth 6 billion people lived. In the 20th century, despite big human losses in the First and World War II wars, the population increased rapidly thanks to decline in mortality from diseases and hunger, to achievements of science and medicine.
According to forecasts of the UN, by 2025 the population of Earth will exceed 8 billion, by 2050 will be 9 billion.
In different regions of Earth during the different periods the size of increase in population varies. Here the level of birth rate, mortality and life expectancy of people plays a role that, in turn, depends on different factors - the standard of living, crime rate, the military conflicts, etc. In the so-called developed countries the level of birth rate is small, and life expectancy long. To the contrary, in the countries which are considered to be poorly developed, birth rate indicators high, but the big mortality and short life expectancy.