News release: “With fewer children being born and people living longer, the population of the Asia-Pacific region is steadily growing older – so much so, that since 2000, the region’s annual population growth has fallen to 1.1 per cent – the lowest rate among the world’s developing regions. This finding is one of many contained in the Statistical Yearbook for Asia and the Pacific 2008, released by the United Nations’ regional arm—the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP). The wideranging Yearbook is the region’s leading compilation of statistical data which provides a detailed picture of the major economic, social and environmental trends over the past two decades.”