The 32 countries competing in the World Cup qualified from a selection process involving 204 national teams, with the exception of hosting nation Brazil – they had a secured spot. “The countries’ combined population covers a sizeable proportion of the global population – approximately 1.9 billion people out of a world population of around 7.3 billion people,” said Amlan Roy, Head of Global Demographics and Pension Research at Credit Suisse. “From an economic point of view, these 32 countries account for a combined gross domestic product (GDP) of $47 trillion.” Credit Suisse’s recent study “World Cup 2014 Countries: Spotlighting Demographics,” analyzes each of the participating countries’ core demographic variables, which play a fundamental role in their economic and financial development.

Rich and Poor, Young and Old – And Everything In Between

While the fact that each World Cup team gets 11 players a side gives the competing countries an equal chance on the football field, there are stark variations in the nations’ living standards, workers, consumers, education, and health. The countries range from rich to poor, young to old, developed to developing, and hail from seven regions across the globe – Africa, Europe, Middle East, North America, Central America & Caribbean, Oceania and South America. “Demographics has far-reaching and multifaceted implications for growth, fiscal sustainability, asset prices, pensions, urbanization, inequality and youth unemployment,” Roy explained. “People and countries are changing demographically, leading to historically unprecedented challenges to (economic) policies and theories, thus collectively changing societies as a whole.”

Life Expectancy

There is a 33-year divergence in life expectancies at birth between competing nations Japan, the country with the highest longevity, and Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), which has the lowest. The life expectancy in Japan currently stands at 83.5 years, followed by 82.5 years in Switzerland and 82.3 years in Italy, compared to 50.5 years in Côte d’Ivoire, 52.3 years in Nigeria and 54.9 years in Cameroon.





Median Age

There is also a large spread in the median age of the 32 countries. The three African countries with the lowest life expectancy – Nigeria, Cameroon and Côte d’Ivoire – are also the youngest nations in the tournament, with median ages of 17.7, 18.5, and 19.1 years respectively, compared to Japan and Italy, which have median ages of 46.5 and 45 years. “This gap of 26 to 29 years in median age is monumental,” Roy said.

Fertility Rates

The number of children per woman of childbearing age is the highest in Nigeria, with an average of 6 children per woman, followed by 4.9 children per woman in Côte d’Ivoire and 4.8 children per woman in Cameroon. Bosnia & Herzegovina, Portugal and South Korea have the lowest fertility rates at 1.3 children per woman. This amounts to a fertility rate difference of 4.7 children per woman between the most fertile country and the least.

Population Growth

The population growth differential is 3.2 percent per annum among the 32 countries. Once again, three African countries post the fastest annual population growth rate, with Nigeria at 2.8 percent, followed by Cameroon at 2.5 percent and Côte d’Ivoire at 2.3 percent. At the opposite end of the scale, population growth actually declines each year in five developed countries: Croatia (-0.4 percent), Russia (-0.2 percent), Bosnia & Herzegovina, Germany and Japan (-0.1 percent).

Net Migration

Net migration rates – defined as the number of net migrants per 1,000 residents – show that Switzerland has the highest influx of immigrants at nearly 8 per 1,000 residents, followed by Australia with nearly 7 per 1,000 residents and the U.S. at around 3.5 per 1,000 residents. In contrast, Mexico, Uruguay and Honduras post the largest outflow of their residents, at nearly 2 per 1,000 residents. This amounts to net migration rate differences of nearly 10 per 1,000 residents. “The increasingly globalized world and movement of people across boundaries has led to a changed mix of players representing countries in sports over the last few decades,” Roy explained. “The ethnic mix and the natives versus immigrants that comprise national teams – not just in football, but in all sports – has radically changed. Talented sports people have become more global in terms of both their profile and their market value.” One third of the competing countries at the World Cup have 20 or more of their national squad players playing in foreign leagues. Each national squad is composed of 23 players and a coach.

It remains to be seen how the competition will play out on the football pitch. But in the real world, demographics matter enormously to a country’s success. “All of these demographic facts are really about consumers and workers, and are thus of crucial importance to the economic, financial and market development of these countries,” Roy said.