Birth rate
- ICSE Class 10, Unit 5 Population
Birth rate, also called natality, is the number of live births per thousand people in one year.
Counting births alone does not help compare a village with a city. So births are shared out per thousand people, over one year. The same idea gives the other population terms:
- Death rate, or mortality: deaths per thousand people in one year.
- Growth rate: roughly, the birth rate minus the death rate.
- Population density: the number of people living in each square kilometre.
A small example
A town has 20,000 people. In one year, 400 babies are born alive and 160 people die. The birth rate is 400 divided by 20, which is 20 per thousand. The death rate is 160 divided by 20, which is 8 per thousand. So the population grows by about 12 per thousand that year.
Where marks go
These terms turn up as one-mark choices. The 2024 ICSE Biology paper asked over what time birth rate is counted. CISCE's 2024 Biology report records "10 years" chosen instead of "one year".
In 2025, the paper asked for the name of the number of live births per thousand people per year. The answer was natality. CISCE's 2025 report names "mortality" and "population growth rate" as the wrong picks. Learn each term with its full definition: what is counted, per how many, and over what time. See why marks slip away on answers you know.
Sources
Facts last checked against these sources on 30 September 2026.
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