Population gives you Production and Science, but it is more important that Production and Science give you population!

but, while skillful tactical usage of your combat units may result in a war advantage over your enemies, the purpose of capturing their territories in the first place is always about capturing their population. Growth is the ultimate resource because the only way of winning the game (outside of super-cheese strategies, like winning economic victory by saving up a fortune in the extremely early game) is to use your superior population mass to achieve either economic, scientific or military domination. Everything you do in the game - including even researching through the tech tree - ultimately all feeds back into the overarching purpose of increasing your empire's population count through growth. Population is what allows you to do anything in the game, whether that is extracting minerals used for construction or waging war on opponents. There is essentially just one winning resource in Pandora: First Contact: Population points.

Download free pandora first contact