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This article focuses on local population projections in England and Wales. Population projections are still made frequently, although it is more widely recognised that their predictive value for more than relatively few years ahead is generally low. They can be used to bring out the implications of assumptions about population tendencies, such as the continuance or specified future development of certain rates of fertility, mortality or marriage. The set of 16 projections made for the Royal Commission on Population is largely of this nature. Often, however, they are made for administrative needs, for which a tough figure is better than none and even fairly long-term calculations may be useful as a working basis, for it is usually possible to adapt the resulting decisions later to changes in conditions involving revisions in the projections. The methods employed have been many and various. In the past mathematical curves, such as the logistic, have often been used to project total numbers. Some kind of component method, extrapolating in the first place the elements of population change, is perhaps mote accurate; it is more or less essential if a breakdown by sex and age or other characteristics is needed.