The question of who should be responsible for meeting the rapidly growing need and expenses for elderly care remains a contentious issue in many countries. Credit: Shutterstock.

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Apr 15 2026 (IPS)

Who should be responsible for providing care and covering expenses for the elderly? Should it be governments, the elderly themselves, their families, a combination of the three, or a new societal arrangement?

As populations age and more elderly individuals live longer lives, there are relatively fewer workers and less tax revenue, causing governments to struggle with the challenge of providing care for the elderly. This struggle is particularly notable in the provision of nursing care and health services.

The challenge is mainly driven by the growing demand for care, workforce shortages, and rapidly rising costs. These issues are expected to become increasingly difficult to sustain in the upcoming years.

Furthermore, this challenge is complicated by age discrimination towards elderly individuals. This discrimination is increasingly prevalent and has a negative impact on older people’s physical and mental well-being. It is associated with earlier death, poorer physical and mental health, and slower recovery from disability in older age.

The proportion of the world’s population aged 65 years or older has doubled from 5% in 1950 to 10% today and is expected to reach 16% by 2050. Most of the world’s elderly are below the age of 75, with 41% in the age group 65 to 69 and 29% in the age group 70 to 74 (Figure 1).

Source: United Nations.

The increase in the proportion of elderly individuals is significantly greater in many countries. For example, in Japan, the proportion of elderly has increased six-fold since 1950. Similarly in Italy and China, the proportion of elderly has tripled since 1950. By 2050, it is projected that approximately one-third of the populations of Japan, Italy, and China will be elderly (Figure 2).

Source: United Nations.

In addition to population ageing, life expectancy at birth for the world’s population has increased from 46 years in 1950 to 74 years in 2026. It is projected that by 2070, the global life expectancy at birth will nearly reach 80 years, with many countries, such as France, Japan, Italy, Norway, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland, expected to reach life expectancies at birth of around 90 years.

Elderly individuals in need of care are more likely to be women, 80-years-old and older, and live in single households. Many of them experience social isolation while living at home, which negatively impacts their mental and physical health. Additionally, these individuals typically have lower incomes than the country’s average.

The cost of providing care for elderly individuals varies drastically across countries. Costs for care are mainly driven by labor costs, healthcare infrastructure, and government subsidies.

Governments, especially those leaning towards political conservatism, are hesitant to cover the increasing expenses associated with care for the growing numbers of elderly. In the United States, for example, the president recently announced that it’s not possible for the federal government to fund Medicare, Medicaid, and child care costs. Instead, he argued that the one thing the federal government must take care of is the country’s military spending

Many high-income countries rely on migrant workers with irregular work contracts, to fill labor gaps, often operating with limited legal protections and standardized training. The situation is further complicated by poor working conditions, comparatively low salaries, and a lack of recognition making recruiting and retaining care workers difficult.

High-income countries have relatively high annual costs for care, while low-to-middle-income countries typically rely on family members to provide assisted care for the elderly.

For example, in the United States, the average annual cost in an assisted living community is approximately $75,000. Care in Switzerland is also expensive, with nursing home costs averaging over 100,000 Swiss francs annually. Similarly in Germany, the average annual cost for nursing home care is roughly between 36,000 to over 48,000 Euros.

Among OECD countries, publicly funded elder care systems still leave nearly half of older people with care needs at risk of poverty, especially those with severe care needs and low income. Out-of-pocket costs represent, on average, 70% of an older person’s median income across OECD countries.

Governments, especially those leaning towards political conservatism, are hesitant to cover the increasing expenses associated with care for the growing numbers of elderly.

In the United States, for example, the president recently announced that it’s not possible for the federal government to fund Medicare, Medicaid, and child care costs. Instead, he argued that the one thing the federal government must take care of is the country’s military spending.

Conservative and authoritarian governments typically do not see much economic benefit from government spending on elderly care, as they perceive the elderly as a societal burden. They argue that health care costs for the elderly is negatively correlated with economic growth and tend to oppose publicly funded efforts for life extension, advocating for limited government spending in these areas.

Furthermore, these conservatives and government officials often stress the importance of individual responsibility and solutions from the private sector. They believe that the costs of caring for the elderly should be borne by the elderly and their families.

However, the total cost of care for the elderly is often unaffordable for most families. In many OECD countries, elderly individuals risk falling into poverty without substantial financial assistance from their governments.

Some countries, such as Germany, Japan, South Korea, and the Netherlands, have implemented mandatory enrolment in elder care insurance. These programs are typically funded through mandatory payroll contributions.

In many countries, however, informal care for the elderly is still provided by family members, with the majority being women. This informal care is facing increasing strain due to factors such as urbanization, declining fertility rates, dual-career families, workforce mobility, and rising financial costs, all of which are putting pressure on the capacity of families to care for elderly relatives.

Although the need for elder care is rapidly increasing worldwide, the ability of existing systems to respond to current and rising needs remains limited in many countries. Most individuals in need of care rely on families and informal caregivers for support, while care services remain expensive, unstable, and difficult to access. These circumstances place significant strains on families, caregivers, and health care systems.

Further complicating care systems is the fact that elderly individuals often suffer from chronic health conditions. Some common health issues experienced by the elderly include Alzheimer’s disease, arthritis, asthma, back and neck pain, cancer, cataracts, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), dementia, diabetes, frailty, falls and injuries, heart disease, hearing loss, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, osteoarthritis, stroke, and urinary incontinence. Furthermore, as individuals age, they are more likely to experience multiple health conditions simultaneously (Table 1).

Source: World Health Organization.

In conclusion, as a result of population ageing and increased longevity, countries are facing the challenge of providing care for their elderly citizens. The question of who should be responsible for meeting the rapidly growing need and expenses for elderly care remains a contentious issue in many countries.

The general public believes that the government should take on the responsibility of providing care for the elderly. In contrast, many governments, concerned about the escalating fiscal burden, prefer that the elderly and their families themselves provide the necessary care and be responsible for the expenses. Still, others believe that a new societal arrangement is needed to provide care for the elderly.

Joseph Chamie is a consulting demographer, a former director of the United Nations Population Division, and author of many publications on population issues.

Life expectancies at birth reveal significant disparities in death rates. Some of the lowest life expectancies at birth, around 55 years, are seen in sub-Saharan African countries, such as Nigeria, Chad, and South Sudan. Credit: Shutterstock

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Apr 7 2026 (IPS)

As stated in Hamlet, “Thou know’st ’tis common; all that lives must die, Passing through nature to eternity.” Although death is inevitable for all living beings, human mortality, which is expected to reach approximately 64 million individual deaths worldwide in 2026, is not evenly distributed across populations.

While mortality is a common fate for all humans, the timing, causes, and circumstances of death vary greatly across and within countries. This discrepancy often leads to a gap in death rates between privileged and marginalized groups.

Inequalities in human mortality are evident worldwide. Premature death is particularly prevalent in low-income regions due to limited access to healthcare, poverty, and conflict. This results in a world where some individuals pass away at young ages while others enjoy a long life.

From the first year of life, significant differences in the likelihood of death among human populations become apparent. Countries such as Iceland, Japan, and Finland have some of the lowest infant mortality rates, with less than 2 infant deaths per 1,000 live births. In contrast, nations like Niger, Somalia, and Nigeria have some of the highest rates, with more than 62 infant deaths per 1,000 births, which is 30 times higher than the lowest rates (Figure 1).

Source: United Nations.

The disparities in infant mortality rates are also evident in maternal mortality rates. In 2023, some of the highest maternal mortality rates are found in sub-Saharan African countries, such as South Sudan, Chad, and Nigeria, with more than 1,000 maternal deaths per 100,000 births. In contrast, countries like Norway, Poland, and Iceland have rates of less than 3 maternal deaths per 100,000 births.

Similarly, life expectancies at birth in 2025 reveal significant disparities in death rates. Some of the lowest life expectancies at birth, around 55 years, are seen in sub-Saharan African countries, such as Nigeria, Chad, and South Sudan. Conversely, countries like Japan, South Korea, and Switzerland have relatively high life expectancies at birth, approximately 30 years greater at about 85 years (Figure 2).

Source: United Nations.

Disparities in death rates persist when comparing life expectancies at age 65. In 2025, life expectancy at age 65 is around 12 years in Nigeria, Chad, and Togo, while it is approximately 23 years in Japan, France, and Australia.

Mortality variations exist not only among countries but also within countries. For instance, in 2022, life expectancy at birth in the United States varied from highs of about 80 years in Hawaii, Massachusetts, and New Jersey to lows of approximately 73 years in Kentucky, Mississippi, and West Virgina (Figure 3).

Source: U.S. National Vital Statistics System.

Differences in life expectancy at birth exist among the major ethnic groups in the United States. In 2021, life expectancies at birth for these groups varied considerably, approximately 84 years for Asians, 78 for Latinos, 77 for Whites, 72 for Blacks, and 64 for Native Indians.

Furthermore, differences in life expectancy at birth also exist based on income and education. Generally, individuals from working-class backgrounds and those with lower levels of education can expect to live shorter lives compared to wealthier and more educated individuals.

For example, in the United States, working-class individuals can expect to die at least 7 years earlier than their wealthy counterparts. Higher education is also linked to higher income, lifestyle improvements, increased access to health-care, and longer life spans.

In addition to deaths caused by illness, disease, accidents, violence, conflict, and war, voluntary human death is becoming a significant global issue.

Inequalities in human mortality exist both among nations and within them, spanning various social and economic dimensions. While death is a natural part of life, the distribution of human deaths is unequal, with some individuals passing away at a young age while others enjoy a long life

Medically assisted death, also known as death with dignity, voluntary assisted dying, or medical aid in dying (MAID), is a topic of debate in many countries. This practice can involve assisted suicide, where the individual takes the lethal medication themselves, or euthanasia, where a doctor administers the medication.

While MAID is not legal in most countries, it is permitted in a growing number of countries under certain circumstances. Definitions and eligibility for medically assisted death vary across countries and states or provinces within countries.

Although laws vary in scope from place to place, jurisdictions that allow medically assisted death generally permit mentally competent, terminally ill, or suffering adults to end their lives with medical assistance. To qualify for voluntary assisted dying, individuals must meet certain criteria, which often include having a terminal or incurable illness with a short-term prognosis, being of sound judgment, voluntarily deciding to end their life, repeatedly expressing their desire to die, and self-administering the lethal dose.

Approximately twenty countries and various states or provinces within countries permit medically assisted death. These places include Austria, parts of Australia, Belgium, Canada, Colombia, Ecuador, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, and parts of the United States. In a number of other countries, including France, Germany, Ireland, Portugal, and Great Britain, legislators are considering bills on laws or rules on medically assisted death.

Among those who choose to take a lethal dose of medication, some key concerns for many of them include the loss of autonomy, control, bodily functions, and dignity; minimizing severe pain and intense emotional distress; inability to engage in enjoyable or meaningful life activities; reduced quality of life; fear of becoming a burden on family and caregivers; anxiety over future suffering; and avoidance of financial implications of treatment.

Additionally, some of the most common medical conditions in euthanasia requests include cancer in a terminal phase, Alzheimer’s disease, dementia, constant suffering, and advanced cardiovascular disorders.

Those opposed to medically assisted death offer several arguments against it. They believe it creates the potential for abuse; leads to a slippery slope towards involuntary euthanasia; normalizes death as a solution; and undermines medical ethics and the sanctity of life.

They also argue that assisted suicide poses risks to vulnerable populations by influencing societal attitudes and policies towards older adults, the seriously ill, and the disabled. They believe it could lead to placing pressure on those considered a societal burden, jeopardizing funding and provision of palliative care. Additionally, there are concerns about ensuring that individuals’ decisions to end their lives are genuinely voluntary.

In summary, inequalities in human mortality exist both among nations and within them, spanning various social and economic dimensions. While death is a natural part of life, the distribution of human deaths is unequal, with some individuals passing away at a young age while others enjoy a long life.

The unequal distribution of resources often leads to a mortality gap between privileged and marginalized groups. Premature death is particularly prevalent in low-income regions, primarily due to factors such as limited access to healthcare, poverty, and conflict. Additionally, the contentious issue of voluntary human death, also known as medically assisted death, is receiving global attention. There are strong arguments both in favor of and against this policy, with around twenty countries allowing it under specific circumstances.

Joseph Chamie is a consulting demographer, a former director of the United Nations Population Division, and author of many publications on population issues.

The world’s population is currently at a record high of 8.3 billion and is expected to continue growing throughout the 21st century, significantly impacting planetary sustainability. Credit: Shutterstock

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Mar 23 2026 (IPS)

On planet Earth, world population in 2026 is 8.3 billion people, which is four times larger than it was a hundred years ago.

Despite this record number of humans living on the planet, world population is expected to continue increasing throughout the 21st century, significantly impacting planetary sustainability.

Over the past two hundred years, the human population on the planet has experienced unprecedented growth rates. For example, it took thousands of years for world population to reach the one billion mark at the beginning of the 19th century, in 1804.

In the subsequent centuries, the growth of world population accelerated with record high rates of demographic growth. It took approximately 123 years for the world’s population to increase from one billion to two billion and 47 years for the world population to double again, reaching four billion in 1974.

The time required for the subsequent billion additions to the world population was relatively short, approximately twelve years. In summary, the human population on planet Earth has increased five-fold since the beginning of the 20th century (Figure 1).

Source: United Nations.

United Nations population projections anticipate that world population will continue to grow throughout the 21st century. By around 2060, world population is expected to reach 10 billion, which is ten times the size it was in 1804. Furthermore, world population is projected to peak at 10.3 billion in 2084 and then slightly decrease to 10.2 billion by the end of the century.

As the world population has grown rapidly, the geographic distribution of billions of people across the planet has also significantly changed since the beginning of the 20th century.

Particularly notable are the changing proportions of the world’s population living in Africa and Europe. At the start of the 20th century, the proportions of the world’s population living in Africa and Europe were 8% and 25%, respectively. By the end of the 21st century, those proportions are projected to be 37% for Africa and 6% for Europe (Table 1).

Source: United Nations.

Another significant change involves the proportion of the world’s population living in Asia. At the beginning of the 20th century, around 60% of the world’s population lived in Asia. However, by the close of the 21st century, that proportion is expected to decrease significantly to 45%.

The proportions of the world’s population living in the other three major regions have been relatively stable, remaining in single digits. The proportions for Latin America and the Caribbean, Northern America and Oceania are approximately 8%, 5% and 1%, respectively.

The shifts in the global distribution of world population have led to significant economic, political, social, and environmental implications. Despite these important consequences, much attention in the media, business boardrooms, and government offices is focused on low fertility rates and the resulting population decline in many countries.

It is the case that more than half of the countries worldwide have fertility rates below replacement levels, leading to population decline and demographic ageing. However, the media often portrays a stable or smaller population in a negative light.

The consequences of the ongoing population growth, projected to reach 10.3 billion people by 2084, will lead to a complex mixture of global problems that many governments, unfortunately, typically ignore, dismiss, or minimize

In such reporting, terms like “weak” or “anemic” are used to describe moderate population growth, while “flat” or “stalled” are used for stable population. Additionally, those who warn of depopulation often predict a future crisis instead of discussing any positive relief from current environmental and climate concerns or the benefits for women and working families.

Many people, especially traditional economists and right-wing politicians, assume that population growth is essential for a flourishing economy. These individuals advocate for population growth because they believe it drives economic growth, increases the labor supply, and stimulates consumption.

The concern about the birthrate crisis is often fueled by those who benefit from a growing population. These individuals often provide information or central messages, such as population collapse, failing economies, demographic crisis, and human extinction, which are then picked up by the media and lead to misleading headlines.

Moreover, many government officials are calling for increased population growth through higher fertility rates and implementing policies and actions to support such outcomes. These calls, policies, and actions are primarily driven by concerns over demographic ageing, declining workforces, and economic sustainability.

In essence, their message is that a growing population leads to a larger economy, more entrepreneurs, market expansion, and innovation. Additionally, some government officials choose to focus on women and blame them for their country’s low birth rates.

In contrast, a stable population is often viewed as stagnant. The demographic ageing of populations and increased human longevity are seen as problematic, leading to a “demographic winter” with significant financial stresses on government budgets for pensions and health care for older individuals.

While the world’s population of 8.3 billion is projected to continue growing throughout most of the 21st century, low fertility rates and demographic ageing are seen as challenges rather than accomplishments.

Additionally, as the planet’s environmental and climate crises accelerate, large portions of society continue to ignore the fact that a world with more than 8 billion people is a critical factor driving them. These groups typically dismiss research findings indicating that a world population of 8 billion, which is continuing to increase, drives climate change, ecological disruption, rising sea levels, biodiversity loss, habitat destruction, resource scarcity, and food insecurity.

For example, global wildlife is currently facing a worsening crisis. The most recent United Nations assessment warns that nearly half of the world’s migratory animal species are declining due to human activity, habitat destruction, and climate change.

Moreover, melting glaciers in Antarctica are hastening sea-level rise in coastal cities. The Thwaites Glacier, in particular, is melting at an alarming pace. If it were to break apart completely and collapse today, it could raise global sea levels by 2 feet in the next few decades, affecting tens of millions of people worldwide.

In summary, the world’s population is currently at a record high of 8.3 billion and is expected to continue growing throughout the 21st century, significantly impacting planetary sustainability.

The consequences of the ongoing population growth, projected to reach 10.3 billion people by 2084, will lead to a complex mixture of global problems that many governments, unfortunately, typically ignore, dismiss, or minimize. These problems include resource strains, increased conflict, environmental damage, climate change, sea level rise, habitat destruction, biodiversity loss, food insecurity, increased unauthorized migration, and greater societal vulnerabilities.

Joseph Chamie is a consulting demographer, a former director of the United Nations Population Division, and author of many publications on population issues.

Total Fertility Rate (TFR) is the average number of children that would be born to a woman over her lifetime. Source: World Population Prospects 2022 report from the Population Division of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs

By Nandita Bajaj
ST. PAUL, Minnesota, USA, Mar 12 2026 (IPS)

As birthrates continue to decline in many industrialized countries, anxious governments are running out of schemes to keep women procreating.

In the US, millionaires and billionaires are lining up to donate to Trump’s “baby bonus” savings accounts. Trump accounts give parents $1,000 for all babies born between now and 2028, plus whatever private donors add.

Late last year tech billionaires Michael and Susan Dell donated $6.25 billion to them. The accounts are part of Trump’s far-Right pronatalist agenda, and also part of the broader trend of governments using heavy-handed pronatalist policies, ranging from bribes to outright coercion, to convince women to have more babies and shore up the supply of future workers, taxpayers, and soldiers.

These interventions are notoriously ineffective. A recent Heritage Foundation report recommended using economic incentives to convince American women to have more babies, “with preferences for larger-than-average [families],” while shaming those who choose to have fewer or no children.

A family in South Korea, which has the lowest Total Fertility Rate in the world (0.8).

But it also admitted, “Other nations have tried to reverse declining birthrates through financially generous family policies, none has succeeded. Government spending alone does not ensure demographic success.”

Nor can such policies achieve what Heritage calls “success.” Trying to raise birthrates by incentivizing women to have babies not only undermines hard-won reproductive rights, it’s a waste of money.

Such spending is not a priority for U.S. taxpayers, as most Americans do not see falling birth rates as a crisis. Instead, they overwhelmingly want the government to address untenably high child care costs. But a one-time Trump account infusion makes no dent in high costs of raising children and other barriers to motherhood.

Just as recent cuts to SNAP and Medicaid disproportionately affect marginalized women and children, Trump accounts benefit least those who need help most. By the Administration’s own calculations, the accounts will benefit wealthy parents disproportionately.

This shouldn’t be surprising. Trump accounts and other pronatalist policies aren’t really about empowerment or saving families or supporting children. They are a bid to make more white Americans, part of a larger nativist program which includes cracking down on immigration from African and Muslim countries, detaining and deporting non-white people in huge numbers, and even abandoning former U.S. efforts to fight child exploitation and trafficking.

These policies overtly stoke panic about falling birthrates, and tacitly uphold the white supremacist “great replacement” conspiracy theory.

That makes support for pronatalism from some progressives especially disturbing. Even if their intent is not nativist, advocating policies that push women to have more children is anti-feminist and fundamentally at odds with reproductive agency.

And even when such policies intend to serve feminist goals–for example Finland’s generous parental leave and child and health care—they fail to raise birthrates. That’s because the biggest factor in childbearing decisions isn’t affordability; it’s empowerment.

Nobel prizewinning economic historian Claudia Goldin has shown high birthrates are no longer tied to economic prosperity, as women increasingly choose education and careers over traditional family roles. In fact, she found an inverse relationship between per capita income and fertility. “Wherever you get increased agency,” she said, “you get reduction in the birth rate.”

Another study across 136 countries confirms this: whenever women achieve reproductive agency, birthrates decline, whether the economy is growing or shrinking.

But hundreds of millions of women and girls are denied this agency. Over 640 million alive today were child brides (including in the US). Over 220 million have an unmet need for contraception. More than half of pregnancies are unintended—121 million annually. Cuts in USAID and other aid programs make the situation more dire.

Despite birthrates declining in many countries, global population is going up, projected to swell by 2 billion to 10.4 billion by the 2080s, with vast ecological and social consequences. Extreme climate events are expected to kill more than a billion people and displace up to 3 billion this century, most in countries where women and girls are disempowered and fertility rates remain high. Pronatalism will only make ecological and social crises worse.

We need new policy thinking that recognizes this and embraces the many advantages of declining fertility and less growth. As fertility rates fall, female labor participation will increase and gender pay gaps will narrow.

As median age rises, changing demographics could enable policy shifts that improve wages and conditions for workers and extend job opportunity to billions on the sidelines who want work but don’t have it.

There is no lack of good ideas, from economic models that center wellbeing and rethink growth to radical ecological democracy. Exploring them requires getting off the endless growth treadmill that enriches elites at the expense of the rest of us. We must stop treating women like reproductive vessels for making more people to serve the economy, and start reshaping our economies to serve more people and the planet.

Nandita Bajaj is executive director of the NGO Population Balance, senior lecturer at Antioch University, and producer and host of the podcasts OVERSHOOT and Beyond Pronatalism. Her research and advocacy work focuses on addressing the combined impacts of pronatalism and human expansionism on reproductive and ecological justice.

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In Japan, the youth group donated the proceeds from their recycling to single-mother families with hospitalized children through the NPO Keep Mama Smiling. Credit: Karuta Yamamoto.

By Karuta Yamamoto
TOKYO, Japan, Mar 6 2026 (IPS)

From the beginning, this project was a collaboration between student teams in Japan and Korea. Although we live in different countries, we shared one common question: How can young people reduce waste while supporting families facing food insecurities?
Our journey began with a problem we could see clearly in our communities.

In Japan, food insecurity often hides behind quiet dignity. According to a recent survey by Save the Children Japan, over 90 percent of low-income households with children reported struggling to afford enough food, with many families forced to cut back on even basic staples such as rice due to rising prices.

The Japan and Korean team of all 11 students presented ‘The Co-creation of Youth from Waste to Hope’ at the 9th Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD 9) Thematic Event. Credit: Ticad 9

The Japanese team leader, Karuta Yamamoto, and the Korean team presented ‘What we want in Africa for the future’ at the Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea, during TICAD 9.

Japan and Korea Team Leader, Karuta Yamamoto and Emma Shin, in an interview with UNFPA Seoul. Credit: Karuta Yamamoto

The Korean team set up a shop at a bazaar at Arumjigi, Seoul, Korea. Credit: Karuta Yamamoto

Single-parent households—most led by mothers—face especially high levels of food hardship and are often compelled to make painful decisions about how limited budgets are spent. For some families, this means choosing between symbolic moments of celebration and everyday nutrition. A ¥3,000 Christmas cake may represent joy for one household, but for another, that same amount must stretch to five kilograms of rice—enough to feed a family for several days.

At the same time, vast amounts of edible food are wasted in Japan. Official statistics show that millions of tons of food are discarded annually in Japan, much of it still edible. Seasonal items such as Christmas cakes, which cannot be sold after December 25, are frequently thrown away. This contrast—waste on one side and hunger on the other—reflects the global challenge addressed by SDG 12: Responsible Consumption and Production.

As students in Japan and Korea, we asked ourselves, “What role can we play in closing this gap?”

We knew that awareness alone would not change habits. enough. Instead of telling people to feel guilty about food waste, we decided to take action together.

We began locally, but with shared purpose.

In Japan, students at Dalton Tokyo Senior High School noticed that mandarin oranges—one of the country’s most common fruits—often go uneaten, with peels and seeds discarded. In Korea, students identified a different issue: more than 150,000 tons of used coffee grounds are discarded each year, contributing to landfill emissions and greenhouse gas emissions.

Different materials.

One shared goal.

Rather than seeing waste as the end of a product’s life, we saw it as a beginning.

Research shows that citrus peels contain essential oils that can be used in soaps and cleaning products. Studies in Korea also demonstrate that spent coffee grounds can be processed into sustainable biomaterials suitable for eco-friendly design and 3D printing. Plantable seed paper—made from recycled paper embedded with seeds—is another example of how waste can be transformed into something regenerative.

Inspired by these ideas, our student teams turned theory into action.

Japanese students created handmade soaps using discarded citrus peels.

Handmade soaps using discarded citrus peels. Credit: Karuta Yamamoto

The soaps ready for sale. Credit: Karuta Yamamoto

Korean students developed 3D-printed clip-on vases incorporating recycled coffee grounds, encouraging people to reuse empty bottles and cups instead of discarding them.

The Korean students developed 3D-printed clip-on vases incorporating recycled coffee grounds. Credit: Karuta Yamamoto

They also produced plantable seed paper from recycled materials, allowing waste to literally grow into flowers and herbs.

Korean students produced plantable seed paper from recycled materials. Credit: Karuta Yamamoto.

These products were not sold as charity goods. Instead, they were shared as examples of responsible consumption—showing that waste can have a second life through our design. Through this work, we directly supported SDG 12: Responsible Consumption and Production, which calls for reducing waste through recycling and reuse, and SDG 13: Climate Action, by lowering emissions through upcycling.

At the same time, the funds raised had a clear purpose.

The profits were used to support families facing food insecurity. In Japan, we donated to single-mother families with hospitalized children through the NPO Keep Mama Smiling (see main photo for the opinion piece).

They also provided essential cooking ingredients to the Karuizawa Food Bank. By connecting environmental action with helping families in need, our project also supported SDG 2: Zero Hunger.

The group provided cooking ingredients to the Karuizawa Food Bank. Credit: Karuta Yamamoto

Through this experience, we learned that caring for the planet and caring for people are not separate goals. Waste reduction and hunger relief became connected in one youth-led effort—turning environmental responsibility into community solidarity.

But our collaboration did not stop in Japan and Korea.

Through a partnership with the OneSmile Foundation—an organization that transforms digital smiles into donations—we connected our local initiatives to a global challenge. During workshops, we learned that school meal donations in Lesotho had stopped the previous year. Without reliable meals, many students were struggling to focus in class.

Together, our Japanese and Korean teams raised over 300,000 Japanese yen.

The Japanese and Korean teams celebrate their fundraising efforts. Credit: Karuta Yamamoto

Working with local partners in Lesotho, we organized a community-based food support initiative at Rasetimela High School, which serves 863 students. School feeding programs play a critical role in Lesotho, and recent disruptions have left many students more vulnerable to hunger.

Students at Rasetimela High School in Lesotho receive donations of food. Courtesy: Rasetimela High School

Ninety-one of the most vulnerable students were selected through transparent criteria, including those supported by social welfare programs and those who had previously relied on international assistance. Each selected family received staple foods such as rice and corn flour to make a local staple called pap. Distribution was organized near the school to ensure safety and allow parents to collect the supplies securely.

This cross-border effort—connecting students, NGOs, local leaders, and communities—reflects the spirit of SDG 17: Partnerships for the Goals.

Although we live in different countries, climates, and cultures, this experience reshaped how we understand global cooperation. The students in Lesotho were not distant beneficiaries. We became peers in a shared world.

They became peers in a shared world. Courtesy: Rasetimela High School

As young people, we often believe our impact is limited because we do not control large resources. This project challenged that belief. We learned that we can create change by designing solutions, raising awareness, and working together.

We even tried to measure what we called a “Happiness Index” by counting the smiles of students who received support. Those smiles reminded us that sustainability is not only environmental or economic—it is human.

Our experience shows that youth are not just future leaders. We are active contributors today. When creativity meets collaboration, waste can become opportunity, and local action can grow into global solidarity.

Turning waste into hope is not an abstract idea.
It is a choice—and young people are already making it.

Edited by Dr Hanna Yoon

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Chronic loneliness and social isolation have been consistently linked to detrimental effects on physical and mental health and increased risk of early death. Credit: Shutterstock

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Feb 24 2026 (IPS)

Loneliness is a significant health concern on planet Earth. It affects virtually every aspect of human wellbeing and development worldwide.

As loneliness knows no borders and impacts individuals of all ages and socio-economic background, it has become a major public health issue. Social isolation is now being taken seriously enough to prompt intervention by governments, international agencies, institutions, and communities.

Chronic loneliness and social isolation have been consistently linked to detrimental effects on physical and mental health and increased risk of early death. The World Health Organization (WHO) has recognized loneliness as a pressing global health threat and a defining challenge of our time.

To address this problem, WHO launched an international commission on social connection in November 2023. The commission aimed to have loneliness recognized and resourced as a global public health priority.

The commission issued a report in June 2025 that highlighted three messages. First, social disconnection is widespread, across all regions and age groups. Second, its impacts are severe, affecting health, well-being, and development. And third, solutions exist and should be scaled up urgently.

Additionally, in a 2023 report, the U.S. Surgeon General reported that loneliness increases one’s risk for cardiovascular disease, dementia, stroke, and premature death. Persistent loneliness was reported to be worse for your health than being sedentary or obese and is similar to smoking more than half a pack of cigarettes a day.

The complex interactions among societal changes, technological advancements, especially artificial intelligence, and the Covid-19 pandemic, which reduced economic and social activities, have contributed to increasing levels of loneliness and social isolation. People are meeting in person less frequently than in the past, while self-reported feelings of connection have recently shown signs of worsening.

According to a 2023 Meta-Gallup global survey encompassing 142 countries, 24% of those aged 15 and older, totaling 1.5 billion people worldwide, reported feeling very lonely or fairly lonely on a regular basis. Additionally, 27% or 1.7 billion people reported feeling a little lonely, while 49% or 3 billion people reported not feeling lonely at all (Figure 1).

Source: Meta-Gallup Survey.

Those surveyed who reported feeling lonely were 36 percentage points more likely to experience sadness than those who did not feel lonely. They were also 30 percentage points more likely to experience worry and stress compared to their counterparts who did not experience loneliness. These findings underscore the significant physical and mental health effects of frequent feelings of loneliness and social isolation.

The level of loneliness reported in the 2023 Gallup poll varies significantly across countries, ranging from a high of 45% in Comoros to a low of 6% in Vietnam. In 22 countries, the percentage of adults who felt lonely the day before exceeded 30%, with more than half of them located in Africa (Figure 2).

Source: Gallup Survey.

While loneliness varies significantly among countries, no country is immune to it. Loneliness is not just seen as a personal challenge, but also as a matter of public policy.

Loneliness affects all age groups, but young adults seem to be the most vulnerable. Around 30% of them report feeling lonely every day, with about 63% experiencing significant symptoms of anxiety and depression related to loneliness

Loneliness affects all age groups, but young adults seem to be the most vulnerable. Around 30% of them report feeling lonely every day, with about 63% experiencing significant symptoms of anxiety and depression related to loneliness.

Among older adults, feelings of loneliness decrease, with about 17% of those aged 65 and older reporting loneliness. However, many older adults face isolation due to factors such as declining health, loss of social connections, or decreased mobility. Loneliness is also linked to increased risks of developing dementia, coronary artery disease or stroke.

A follow-up international survey conducted by Gallup in 2024 found that 23% of respondents felt lonely “a lot of the day” just the day before the survey. Additionally, approximately one in five employees worldwide reported experiencing loneliness a lot the previous day.

Moreover, loneliness is more prevalent among employees under the age of 35 than those aged 35 and older. Loneliness also contributes to significant economic and social strain, reducing productivity, and impacting education.

The Gallup survey found that financial status has a strong effect on loneliness worldwide. Men and women who are struggling financially, meaning they find it difficult to get by on their present income, are about twice as likely as those who are better off financially to say they felt lonely a lot the previous day. Additionally, unmarried individuals are more likely to feel lonely than those who are married or in a domestic partnership.

Social isolation and chronic loneliness have long-term negative consequences on the physical and mental health of individuals. Health studies have found that the risk of mortality among people who lack community and social ties is two times greater than that of people who have many social contacts. A WHO report found that loneliness is linked to an estimated 100 deaths every hour, totaling more than 871,000 deaths annually.

Other effects of loneliness and social isolation include a shortened lifespan, cognitive decline, exacerbated mental illness, reduced quality of sleep, higher stress and anxiety levels, adoption of unhealthy habits, and self-loathing thoughts. Strong social connections can lead to better health and reduce the effects of loneliness (Table 1).

Source: Author’s compilation based on health studies.

A variety of factors can contribute to an individual experiencing loneliness, and the scope, duration, and intensity of loneliness can vary. In many cases, there is no single cause, but rather a number of factors that can overlap and intensify each other.

Some of the factors contributing to loneliness are internal, while others are external. Internal factors often involve the way people see themselves and the world around them. They can also include shyness, introversion, low self-esteem, lack of communication skills, and social withdrawal. On the other hand, external factors include physical isolation, relocation, bereavement, divorce, physical disabilities, social exclusion, and over-reliance on social media.

Interacting with another person, even a stranger, can significantly reduce loneliness. Conversely, doing nothing to address social isolation tends to increase loneliness.

Some studies suggest that interacting with an AI companion can reduce loneliness.

Advocates argue that the latest AI chatbots might provide better company than many real people and societies should consider the benefits that AI companions could offer to those who are lonely. Soon, some believe, the most interesting, and maybe the most empathetic conversation that an individual could have will be with AI on almost any topic.

Instead of reacting with horror, advocates of AI chatbots suggest that societies should consider the benefits that AI companions could provide to those who are lonely. Some AI promoters maintain that an inability to relate to humans should not be viewed as a defect, but rather as a virtue.

AI chatbots are becoming increasingly popular as preferred confidants and companions. For example, a study of younger individuals discovered that one-third of teenagers use AI chatbots for social interaction. These teenagers have stated a preference for AI companions over humans for serious conversations, finding them more fulfilling than conversations with actual people.

Nevertheless, there are concerns about using AI companions to address loneliness. Health experts are warning that many individuals, particularly the youth, are developing emotional connections to AI chatbot companions.

Despite these concerns, individuals, especially young people, are seeking companionship and emotional support from AI chatbots. Some fear that relying on AI companions may result in younger generations forming emotional bonds with entities that lack the ability to empathize and care.

By recognizing the signs of loneliness, engaging in meaningful activities, and seeking professional assistance, individuals may be able to reduce their feelings of loneliness and social isolation. A combination of behavioral changes, social intervention, and professional support can be helpful in dealing with loneliness.

Additionally, managing stress resulting from loneliness can be facilitated by exercising, eating healthy, and getting enough sleep. Pursuing enjoyable hobbies and activities may also offer a distraction from loneliness.

Communicating one’s loneliness to family, friends, and colleagues can strengthen existing relationships and provide emotional support. To manage feelings of loneliness, it is also helpful for individuals to remain open to making new connections, stay healthy, and seek professional assistance.

Loneliness is a complex and pervasive issue that exists worldwide. However, there are ways to manage and address it. Methods aimed at reducing loneliness exist at the national, community, family, and individual levels. These methods include increasing awareness and modifying government policies to strengthen social infrastructure, foster inclusivity, and provide psychological support.

Joseph Chamie is a consulting demographer, a former director of the United Nations Population Division, and author of many publications on population issues.

Pyari Hessa (#07) in action for Jamshedpur FT. Credit: Jamshedpur FC

By Diwash Gahatraj
DELHI, Feb 20 2026 (IPS)

Pyari Hessa, 26, balances long shifts as a loco traffic controller at a steel company in Jamshedpur with evening football practice on the same turf where professionals train.

A trans woman from the Ho tribal community, she was born Pyare Lal in Bedamundui, a remote village 50 kilometres away from Chaibasa, the headquarters town of the West Singhbhum district in Jharkhand. For years, she fought against family expectations and societal norms for the right to live authentically and to be seen simply as a person.

Today, as captain and striker for Jamshedpur FT( Football Team) in India’s first-ever football tournament dedicated to transgender women, the Transgender Football League, her fight for acceptance finds powerful expression on the pitch.

League match action between Jamshedpur FC and Chaibasa FC. Photo Credit: Jamshedpur FC

Launched on December 7, 2025, under the Jamshedpur Super League (JSL) by Jamshedpur Football Club (FC), this groundbreaking eight-team tournament brings together around 70 transgender women, many hailing from Santhal, Ho, and other local tribal communities. Hosted at the JRD Tata Sports Complex’s artificial football turf, the league features a fast-paced seven-a-side format.

The players come from different walks of life; some are factory workers, daily wage labourers, stage performers, e-rickshaw drivers, and more, from areas like Chaibasa, Chakradharpur, Noamundi, Saraikela, and beyond, competing not only for goals but also for visibility, dignity, and a true sense of belonging. In this space, they are celebrated for their skill, passion, and teamwork, transcending societal barriers and redefining inclusion through sport.

Kundan Chandra, head of Grassroots and Youth Football at Jamshedpur FC, explains the club’s thinking.

“The introduction of the Transgender Football League marks a progressive and meaningful step in our commitment to making football inclusive, accessible, and empowering for every individual. As a club we firmly believe that football must serve as a platform where talent is nurtured without discrimination.”

For players like Pyari Hessa, that belief is no longer just words. “When I’m playing football, it gives me immense happiness and gives me recognition. The game gives me a chance to rise above my gender identity. It gives me a platform,” Pyari says.

Life wasn’t easy for her, neither at home nor in her search for stable employment.

A Bachelor of Arts graduate, she lost her father at a young age and now lives with her mother in Jamshedpur, far from her ancestral tribal village. Before securing a job, she took on odd jobs as a daily wage worker to make ends meet. Eventually, she found employment in the logistics department of one of India’s leading steel manufacturers under their targeted hiring for under-represented groups.

More league match action between Jamshedpur FC and Chaibasa FC. Credit: Jamshedpur FC

Her tribal identity profoundly shapes her life, but as a trans woman, she faces additional layers of hardship. Traditional tribal communities in Jharkhand, rooted in customs, nature worship, and social norms, often do not accept transgender individuals with the respect they deserve, leading to exclusion, stigma, and limited family or community support.

Jharkhand is home to over 30 indigenous tribes. The culture and social position of transgender people within the tribal (Adivasi) communities here are complex and generally marked by limited traditional recognition or acceptance.

Journey From Village to Pitch

“I started playing football at ten, just like any other boy in my village. We’d kick around plastic balls on the village ground, purely for fun, nothing more,” Pyari says. “When I was in college, I met people from the trans community who played in charity and exhibition matches around Chaibasa. That’s when I realised football wasn’t just a game for me anymore—it gave me a reason to keep going and grow.”

“In those local matches, the winning trans team would get cash and be honoured. Before every game, the organisers would announce to the crowd: ‘Don’t pass gender comments, don’t disturb the players—give them the respect they deserve.’ Hearing that it felt like a small victory.”

Pyari shares these memories with a quiet pride. After winning her match on 25 January, her team triumphed 4-1 against Chaibasa FC.

According to coach Sukhlal Bhumij, who trains Pyari and the other team members, “Trans matches are being played between eight teams, and it happens every alternate Sunday and should be over by April.”

Saraikela FC (yellow) versus Indranagar FC (red) in league competition. Credit: Jamshedpur FC

Love for the Game

Football enjoys a passionate and deeply rooted following in Jharkhand, especially among its tribal communities. In rural villages, children play barefoot on open grounds from a young age, making it a daily part of life and culture. While cricket remains popular, football thrives at the grassroots level through local tournaments and has gained further momentum with Jamshedpur FC in the Indian Super League, where fan groups proudly celebrate tribal identity, explains Bhumij, an All India Football Federation (AIFF) C-License coach.

The sport also empowers many, particularly tribal girls and transgender players, transforming village fields into powerful spaces of pride, inclusion, and social change.

In districts like West Singhbhum, informal transgender exhibitions and charity matches have long been organised by village committees and community groups, often as one-off events, charity fundraisers, or parts of local tournaments to promote visibility and respect.

Puja Soy, one of the league’s highest scorers with seven goals from six matches, says football is finally bringing her community real recognition. The 23-year-old Jamshedpur FT standout, a professional stage dancer who completed her Class 10 education, now lives independently in Jamshedpur. Born as Shoray Soy, she moved away from her parents in DiriGoda village for her higher education and better life.

Sharing the harsh realities she faces off the pitch, Puja says, “No flat owners want to rent houses to people from our community.” Finding even this place was a struggle.” She currently shares a single-room home with another trans woman in Jamshedpur.

Jharkhand aligns its policies for transgender persons with India’s Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2019, allowing individuals to self-identify as the third gender and obtain a Certificate of Identity without mandatory medical proof. Key benefits include inclusion in the OBC category for reservations in education and government jobs, a monthly social security pension of ₹1,000 (about USD 10), dedicated transgender OPDs in government hospitals for discrimination-free care, and access to schemes such as Ayushman Bharat health insurance, scholarships, skill development programmes, and shelter support. The state has also established a Transgender Welfare Board and support unit to facilitate implementation.

However, community members say the reality on the ground differs sharply from what’s written on paper. Despite these provisions, transgender women frequently miss out on job opportunities. To survive, many resort to begging at traffic lights or highway toll points, while others turn to sex work. One player in the league, speaking on condition of anonymity, shared that she plays football during her leisure time but, lacking employment, often stands at highway toll booths or traffic signals to beg from passersby.

Begging by transgender persons has become a common sight on Indian streets and in markets—so normalised that society has largely accepted it as inevitable, even as progressive policies promise a different future.

Freedom on the Field

Back at the practice grounds of the JRD Tata Sports Complex, Pyari is ready for the evening session. Cleats laced up, ball at her feet, she looks focused.

“I can’t come for practice every day because of my shift work,” she says with a small smile. “But whenever my shift ends in the late afternoon, I make sure to come here. This is where I feel free.”

As Pyari starts dribbling, moving the ball smoothly across the turf, it feels like more than just football. With every touch and turn, she’s juggling her job, her life as a trans woman, her tribal roots, and her dreams, all in perfect rhythm, just like the way she controls the ball. In this field, everything seems to fit.

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Hawa Hussein Farah, a market trader in Garissa Town, Kenya, says extreme heat has shortened her working hours and reduced her daily earnings. Credit: Chemtai Kirui/IPS

By Chemtai Kirui
GARISSA, Kenya , Feb 16 2026 (IPS)

By 9 a.m. on a Wednesday, Hawa Hussein Farah is already watching the temperature climb. Awake since 6 a.m., she has prepared her three children for school before walking them to class and heading to Suuq Mugdi, an open-air market in Garissa town, to buy the fruit she will sell.

When she settles into her modest stall, built from wooden poles and covered with draped fabric, the heat is already intensifying beneath the canopy.

On a wooden table, yellow bananas rest in neat clusters beside green-striped watermelons. Mangoes, some blushed red, others golden, are stacked in small pyramids. The shade shields the fruits from direct sunlight, but the air beneath stays warm and dry.

“When it gets this hot, the customers disappear,” Farah says, lifting a bottle of water. “We have to close and go home to rest until it cools.”

Situated in Kenya’s arid northeast, Garissa is in its hottest season. Between January and March, daytime highs typically hover around 36°C (96.8°F).

In early February 2026, temperatures reached 38°C (100.4°F), with “feels-like” readings topping 41°C (107°F), according to Samuel Odhiambo, the county director of meteorological services.

While similar peaks have been recorded in previous years, Odhiambo said recent data show hot conditions are lasting longer, with more consecutive days above seasonal averages. The meteorological agency has issued a biometeorological advisory, warning residents that prolonged exposure increases the risk of heat stress, dehydration, and skin damage.

“If the current pattern continues, temperatures could exceed 40°C (104°F) in March,” he said.

For Farah, these degrees translate into a shorter workday. By noon, exhaustion sets in.

“My body feels weak and I sweat a lot. I drink two or three litres of water in the morning. I don’t even know if it helps.”

She now closes her stall roughly four hours earlier than in cooler months, cutting deeply into her already thin margins.

On cooler days, she brings in about 7,000 shillings (USD 54) in weekly sales. In prolonged heat, that falls to around 4,000 (USD 31), nearly half her usual takings.

Unsold fruit quickly softens, and after two days she lowers prices or sells it to nearby food kiosks for juice to avoid larger losses.

With no fixed salary or protections, each lost hour translates directly into lost income.

As the largest trade hub in northeastern Kenya, Garissa’s economy is anchored by its livestock markets. Data from the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI)  indicate that this economic dependence makes the region uniquely vulnerable: when extreme heat degrades livestock health and keeps buyers away, the resulting financial contagion directly shrinks customer flow for small vendors like Farah.

Emily Ndung’e, a motorcycle taxi rider in Garissa Town, northeastern Kenya, says prolonged high
temperatures are affecting her income as fewer customers travel during the hottest hours. Credit: Chemtai Kirui/IPS

Emily Ndung’e, a motorcycle taxi rider, said she is facing similar losses.

Ndung’e says her daily income has plummeted from 1,500 shillings (USD 11.50) to just 500 (USD 3.80) during the heatwave.

Wearing  protective riding gear traps heat against her skin, and she often waits for hours between rides under the relentless sun.

“The heat gives me rashes and I sweat a lot,” Ndung’e says. “But I have to be out here. This is the work I depend on to feed my children.”

She describes the heat as devastating for both her income and her health. With few shaded areas along the roadside, she moves between scattered tree canopies, waiting for the next client.

Even after sunset, the heat lingers in Garissa’s concrete homes and corrugated roofs, offering little relief to those who have spent the day working outdoors.

Patricia Nying’uro, a climate scientist at the Kenya Meteorological Department who serves as the national focal point for the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), says that hotter nights strip away the body’s ability to recover between hot days.

“When temperatures approach 39°C, or even lower in humid conditions, the risk to outdoor workers increases sharply, particularly with prolonged exposure,” Nying’uro said.

Concerns over rising temperatures in Garissa have previously reached Parliament.

In 2022, Aden Duale, then the Garissa Township lawmaker, formally petitioned the Ministry of Environment regarding ‘public concerns’ over rising temperatures. The ministry acknowledged above-average temperatures linked to climate change. In Garissa’s markets, those shifts now translate into extreme heat events that disrupt daily survival.

Duale now serves as Cabinet Secretary for Health and in October 2025 presided over the launch of Kenya’s Climate Change and Health Strategy (2024–2029), marking the first time heat-related mortality is formally tracked at the national level.

Yet, responsibility for addressing the impacts of extreme heat remains limited.

Garissa has a County Climate Change Action Plan (2023–2028), but it focuses largely on drought, floods and livestock disease. Specific provisions for extreme heat, such as adjusted working hours, public cooling spaces or hydration points – are absent.

The National Drought Management Authority said its mandate centres on drought-related risks, adding that extreme heat on its own does not fall within its response frameworks. Officials directed heat-related enquiries to the Kenya Meteorological Department.

For Farah, that gap is tangible.

“We don’t get any help from the government. We need shade because we suffer in the heat,” she said. “I still pay taxes to the county, but the loss is mine to bear.”

Across Kenya, informal workers like Farah account for roughly 80 percent of the workforce. According to a July 2024 report by the International Labour Organization (ILO), Africa now faces the world’s highest heat exposure, affecting 92.9 percent of its workers.

The agency warns that labour capacity can decline by up to 50 percent under extreme heat—a productivity drain contributing to projected global losses of ISD 2.4 trillion by 2030.

Extreme heat poses a direct challenge to United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 8.8, which mandates safe working environments for all.

Without safeguards against extreme heat, this promise remains unfulfilled, exposing a critical gap in Kenya’s climate strategy and undermining SDG 13’s call for national resilience.

The current National Climate Change Action Plan (NCCAP) prioritises large-scale agriculture and energy infrastructure. It offers few explicit protections for informal market labour.

While the heat is universal, its toll is gendered. Researchers say that women in Garissa face a “double exposure”, navigating extreme temperatures at the stall and then managing the unpaid care of children and seniors in overheated, unventilated homes, facing nearly a 24-hour cycle of stress.

A study by the The Atlantic Council’s Climate Resilience Center found that heat increases a woman’s total work burden by 260 percent when domestic labour is included.

“It’s a regressive tax,” says Kathy Baughman McLeod, CEO of Climate Resilience for All (CRA), citing research in cities like Freetown, Sierra Leone, where informal market women can lose up to 60% of their income during heat-driven disruptions.

“The body perpetually believes it’s under attack,” McLeod adds, “without tools like ‘heat insurance’, currently being piloted in India but absent in Kenya, the crisis erodes both income and physical recovery.”

Sierra Leone was the first country in Africa to adopt a national Heat Action Plan (HAP), which is a comprehensive policy framework designed to prepare for, respond to, and mitigate the health and economic impacts of extreme heat.

According to Dr Joyce Kimutai, who co-authored the State of the Climate Kenya 2024 report alongside Nying’uro, establishing localised Heat Action Plans is now the “most urgent task” for national adaptation.

“Heat continues to be a silent killer,” Kimutai said, adding that because the economic impacts remain poorly quantified, policy responses continue to lag behind the rising mercury.

Nairobi County is currently piloting a draft heat-response framework that would allow authorities to trigger adjusted working hours and open public cooling spaces during extreme conditions.

The proposal has not yet been formally adopted, but Kimutai says she hopes it could serve as a model for other counties.

As temperatures in Garissa edge toward 40°C, Farah’s adaptation strategy remains a solitary one. She packs her unsold, softening fruit, shutters her stall four hours early, and absorbs the financial blow.

For now, there is no policy to shield her livelihood, only the heat.

Note: This article is brought to you by IPS Noram in collaboration with INPS Japan and Soka Gakkai International in consultative status with ECOSOC.

Most major destination countries are shifting from a policy of expanding migrant labor to one of selectivity and restriction in order to manage immigration within their borders, especially unauthorized immigration. Credit: Shutterstock

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Feb 3 2026 (IPS)

The delicate balance of international migration relies on the high demand for labor and the enforcement of stricter immigration controls. This equilibrium is especially crucial when considering the international migration of students and skilled workers.

International students and skilled migrant workers play essential roles in economic development and addressing labor shortages in many countries. However, these individuals are facing increasing obstacles in entering and integrating into destination countries.

Essentially, most major destination countries are shifting from a policy of expanding migrant labor to one of selectivity and restriction in order to manage immigration within their borders, especially unauthorized immigration.

A notable exception to this global trend is Spain, which is granting legal status to half a million undocumented migrants. This policy aims to reduce labor exploitation in Spain’s underground economy and meet the need for around 300,000 migrant workers annually to sustain its economy.

The stricter immigration controls in many destination countries are primarily driven by political shifts to the right, national security concerns, public pressure, unauthorized migration, unlawful border crossings, visa overstays, and anxieties about changing population composition and social integration. These controls are also limiting asylum seekers and low skilled migrants while favoring highly skilled migrants.

Major destination countries have also implemented stricter immigration controls in terms of international student migration.

These controls include stricter visa rules and entry requirements, fixed-term visas, limited years of study, work permit restrictions, higher financial costs, and restrictions on bringing dependents. These measures are driven by high net migration, efforts to curb visa misuse, university enrollment caps, housing pressures, higher financial requirements, and restrictions on bringing family dependents.

In 2024, there were approximately 304 million international migrants worldwide, representing about 3.7% of the world’s population of 8.2 billion. This figure is nearly double the number of international migrants in 1990, which was approximately 154 million, representing 2.9% of the world’s population of 5.3 billion at that time (Figure 1).

Source: United Nations.

The top five migration destination countries and their percentage of all migrants are the United States (17%), Germany (6%), Saudi Arabia (5%), the United Kingdom (4%), and France (3%) (Figure 2).

Source: United Nations.

In contrast, the top five emigration countries and their percentage of all emigrants are India (6%), China (4%), Mexico (4%), Ukraine (3%), and Russia (3%) (Figure 3).

Source United Nations.

As of 2024–2025, there were approximately 7 million internationally mobile students globally. The key destinations for these international students were the United States (17%), Canada (12%), the United Kingdom (11%), France (7%), and Australia (6%). Other major destination countries were Germany, Russia, South Korea, China, and Spain (Figure 4).

Source: United Nations.

In addition to internationally mobile students, there were approximately 168 million migrant workers in 2022, accounting for about 5 percent of the global labor force. About two-thirds of all migrants of working age are in the labor force, with 60% of them being men.

In many of the more developed countries, the percentage of migrant workers in the labor force is significantly higher. For example, in the United States, approximately 20% of the labor force, totaling over 30 million people, consists of immigrants and foreign-born workers who are concentrated in the construction, farming, and service sectors. Canada has an even higher proportion of 30%, with many migrant workers represented in the tech sector, manufacturing, and healthcare.

Migrant workers can be found across all skill levels. Despite many possessing higher qualifications, they are often concentrated in lower-skilled industries such as services, agriculture, construction, and tourism. However, sectors and occupations related to high-skilled information technology and professional work often rely on skilled migrant labor to address labor shortages.

Migrant workers can be found across all skill levels. Despite many possessing higher qualifications, they are often concentrated in lower-skilled industries such as services, agriculture, construction, and tourism. However, sectors and occupations related to high-skilled information technology and professional work often rely on skilled migrant labor to address labor shortages

The populations of most developed countries and many developing countries are experiencing declining, ageing, and diversifying trends in the 21st century. These three profound demographic changes present significant social, economic, political, and ethical challenges.

As populations rapidly evolve during the 21st century, changes in fertility, mortality, and migration are shaping the demographics of many regions. These changes are based on past trends, current data, and projected future patterns over the next eighty years.

Projections suggest that population decline will persist because of low fertility rates remaining below the replacement levels of about two births per woman. Many countries have experienced low fertility rates for an extended period. The population of the more developed countries is expected to decrease by 14 million by 2050, while the least developed countries are projected to grow by 733 million during the same period.

Regarding mortality rates, life expectancies are anticipated to continue rising throughout the century. For instance, the current life expectancy at birth of 80 years in more developed countries is projected to reach approximately 84 years by 2050 and 90 years by the end of the 21st century.

In addition to declining populations and increasing life expectancy, many countries have experienced a “historic reversal” in their age structures. By 2025, 55 countries and areas had experienced this reversal, with more countries expected to undergo the same soon.

This significant demographic milestone occurs when the percentage of individuals aged 65 and older exceeds the percentage of those aged 17 and younger. In simpler terms, it is when older adults outnumber children in a population.

Population ageing is expected to continue throughout the remainder of the 21st century. The median age for more developed countries currently at 42 years is projected to increase to 45 years by 2050 and 48 years by 2100.

Additionally, the proportion of elderly individuals is projected to continue rising. For example, Europe’s elderly population is expected to increase to approximately 30 percent by mid-century.

Major destination countries are also becoming more ethnically diverse due to increasing levels of international migration. For instance, the estimated number of foreign-born individuals in Europe, which was around 57 million at the beginning of the 21st century, has risen to approximately 87 million by 2020.

The population compositions of many countries, including the United States and the United Kingdom, are becoming significantly more ethnically diverse. Population projections suggest that the US and the UK populations will become “minority white” around 2045 and 2065, respectively.

In addition to high levels of legal migration, increasing levels of unauthorized migration pose mounting challenges for many destination countries and for international students and skilled migrant labor.

Notable among these challenges are the negative attitudes and hostilities towards immigrants and their families, as well as the increasing political influence of far-right nationalist parties advocating anti-immigrant policies. These parties are concerned that the growing numbers of immigrants will have a negative impact on their traditional culture, shared values, and national identity. They believe that immigration, especially unauthorized migration, undermines their way of life, national security, ethnic heritage, and social cohesion.

A significant factor fueling the unprecedented high levels of unauthorized migration to many destination countries is the rapid demographic growth of sending countries. Many of these countries, which are struggling with poverty, political instability, civil strife, and climate change, are in the less developed regions of Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

The number of people desiring to emigrate permanently is approximately 1.3 billion. This number significantly exceeds the number of immigrants countries are willing to admit, leading many individuals to migrate without authorization.

Of particular note is Africa’s population, which currently includes 33 of the 46 least developed countries in the world. Africa’s population is expected to more than triple during the 21st century, increasing from approximately 800 million to nearly 4 billion.

In summary, the major demographic features of traditional destination countries for the 21st century are declining, ageing, and diversifying. In contrast, the populations of most sending countries are increasing and remain relatively young, with many of them wishing to emigrate to a developed country.

These potent, pervasive, and differing demographic trends are creating a delicate balance of high demand for labor and the implementation of stricter immigration controls. This balance is especially relevant for international students and skilled migrant labor as it impacts their entry and integration into destination countries.

Joseph Chamie is an independent consulting demographer and former director of the United Nations Population Division.

Finland tops the world happiness rankings again. The US drops to its lowest position ever. Credit: Shutterstock

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Jan 27 2026 (IPS)

The United States is not so happy. Its population has received a lower happiness ranking compared to previous years. The factors contributing to this decline have significant implications for the United States, both domestically and internationally. As Dostoevsky noted, “The greatest happiness is to know the source of unhappiness”.

According to Gallup’s 2025 World Happiness Report, the United States was ranked 24th out of 147 countries, marking its lowest ranking to date (Table 1).

Source: 2025 World Happiness Report.

The top five countries in the happiness ranking were Finland, followed by Denmark, Iceland, Sweden, and the Netherlands. Finland has maintained the top position for the eighth consecutive year, believed to be due to high levels of social support, healthy life expectancy, high GDP, and low corruption.

Furthermore, the populations of the United States neighbors, both to the north and south, had higher happiness rankings than the US. Despite having smaller economies and lower per capita incomes than the United States, Mexico ranked 10th and Canada ranked 18th on happiness among the 147 countries.

In contrast to the Nordic countries, the world’s unhappiest country was once again Afghanistan, with its population reporting particularly poor individual life evaluations. The government dominated by the Taliban continues to make life difficult for women and girls, limiting their access to education and employment.

Sierra Leone ranked as the second least happy country, believed to be a result of significant human rights violations. Lebanon followed closely behind in the 145th position due to its ongoing economic crisis and involvement in regional conflicts.

Happiness rankings vary significantly among the world’s largest economies. Among the top ten countries with the largest economies, Canada held the highest ranking at 18 in 2025, followed by Germany at 22, the United Kingdom at 23, and the United States at 24 (Table 2).

Source: 2025 World Happiness Report.

Since 2012, the mood among the population of the United States has been declining, dropping from 11th to 24th in the global happiness rankings (Figure 1).

Source: World Happiness Reports.

One of the important factors contributing to the low and declining happiness score of the United States is that many of the country’s population feel disconnected, experience financial insecurity, and are socially isolated from those around them.

The disconnection, insecurity, and social isolation are thought to result from the country’s political polarization, votes against “the system”, and general mistrust. The decline in social trust among the US population contributes a large share of the political polarization occurring across the country.

The drop in social trust in the United States arises from the growing despair among the population, frustration with the government, and striking wealth inequalities, which contribute to misperceptions among the country’s voters, leading to a worrisome “us vs. them” mentality.

Despite its national wealth, overall trends across the United States indicate eroding social bonds, increasing political polarization, worsening mental well-being, declining social trust, and rising loneliness. As a result, the country’s population of 343 million is becoming unhappier with each passing year

Additionally, there is a generational divide among the US population, with younger individuals below the age of 30 reporting significantly lower levels of happiness and social connection compared to older generations. This generational gap contributes to dragging down the overall happiness ranking of the United States.

Moreover, despite being a wealthy nation with the world’s largest economy, economic inequalities, the high cost of living, and feelings of financial insecurity are factors contributing to the country’s relatively low happiness ranking. In stark contrast to the United States, Nordic populations have strong social safety nets with support systems that reduce financial insecurity, provide healthcare, and emphasize connection and collective well-being.

Another significant factor believed to be contributing to a not-so-happy United States is the increasing number of people in the population feeling lonely. The United States is considered one of the top five loneliest countries in the world, with 21% of the population reporting feeling lonely always or almost always.

Several years ago, a national survey of the US population found that more than three in five people reported feeling lonely, with increasing numbers experiencing feelings of being left out, misunderstood, and lacking companionship.

In 2025, approximately one in five people in the United States reported that they typically eat their meals alone. Eating alone in the US has become increasingly common across all age groups, particularly among young people. Eating with others is closely linked to well-being, as social connections are crucial for young adults and can help mitigate the negative effects of stress.

The epidemic level of loneliness in the United States, coupled with the rise of single-person households over the past two decades, has exacerbated feelings of disconnection among the country’s population. In contrast, populations in countries with higher levels of happiness have stronger family bonds, a sense of belonging, and more social interactions than the population of the United States.

In summary, despite its national wealth, overall trends across the United States indicate eroding social bonds, increasing political polarization, worsening mental well-being, declining social trust, and rising loneliness. As a result, the country’s population of 343 million is becoming unhappier with each passing year.

Lastly, there is an intriguing political question regarding the consequences of the United States’ unhappiness on its government’s domestic and international policies. If the United States were happier, perhaps its voters would not have elected its current leaders, who are implementing contentious policies, controversial programs, and vindictive schemes.

These policies, programs, and schemes involve taking harsh actions against the country’s immigrants, U.S. citizens who protest these actions, and the media that report on these events. They also include capturing the president and the wife of another country, investigating political opponents and dissidents, promoting false claims, dismissing established facts, pardoning convicted insurrectionists, threatening with tariffs and economic blackmail, attempting to purchase, acquire, or take control of Greenland, dismantling the post-World War II international system, and turning allies into enemies.

Joseph Chamie is a consulting demographer, a former director of the United Nations Population Division, and author of many publications on population matters.

Thoughtful policy changes can help ensure spending pressures remain contained, while creating space to care for elderly people and respond to economic shocks.

By Rahul Anand and Hoda Selim
WASHINGTON DC, Jan 27 2026 (IPS)

Korea’s population is aging faster than almost any other country. That’s because people live longer than in most other countries, while the birth rate is one of the lowest in the world.

About one-fifth of the population is 65 and older, more than triple the share in the 1990s. This matters because older people tend to consume less, which can have wide-ranging economic effects, especially as the pace of population aging accelerates and birth rates do not improve, eventually leading to population decline.

We estimate that every 1 percent decline in Korea’s population will reduce real consumption by 1.6 percent.

Korea has ample room to meet its current spending needs and respond to unforeseen shocks, with central government debt below 50 percent of gross domestic product. However, age-related government spending pressures are likely to rise significantly in coming years. That would substantially reduce fiscal space unless policymakers implement reforms.

We estimate spending on pensions, health care, and long-term care will rise by 30 to 35 percent of GDP by 2050 depending on alternative estimates for long-term spending by different institutions. However, under our baseline scenario—which includes lower potential economic growth due to aging and no measures to offset this, the debt ratio could reach 90 to 130 percent by 2050 depending on the spending estimate used, increasing risks to long-term debt sustainability.

Structural reforms that maintain potential growth—such as those from AI adoption, greater labor force participation and more efficient resource allocation—would create more fiscal room for Korea to support elderly individuals.

However, given high risks and uncertainty around the growth impact of reforms, even with these reforms, debt could still exceed 100 percent of GDP.

In addition to structural reforms, we also recommend fiscal reforms to help create more room in the budget to meet higher spending without putting pressure on public finances.

Greater efficiency

Raising additional revenue will be particularly helpful. In addition to recent changes, such as reversing some corporate tax cuts, policymakers could reconsider existing personal and corporate tax exemptions and simplify them where appropriate.

Reviewing and adjusting certain exemptions for value-added taxes, which have increased, could also help. Similarly, reducing inefficient spending, including streamlining of support for local governments and small- and medium-sized enterprises, could help create space.

Over the long term, making government spending more efficient will help boost the economy’s productive capacity.

To reduce the long-term spending pressures, furthering pension reform remains important. Parliament recently strengthened the finances of the National Pension Service, raising contribution rates to delay future losses. Additional reforms should aim to keep the system sustainable while ensuring fair and adequate benefits.

Finally, adopting a clear and credible quantitative fiscal limit to guide policies to reach fiscal objectives, supported by a stronger medium-term fiscal framework, would help keep government finances stable over the long term while still allowing fiscal policy to respond to shocks when needed.

Moreover, the medium-term framework could forecast and incorporate expected spending on aging, making fiscal policy more predictable and transparent. This could be reinforced by even longer-term strategies that account for future spending pressures and propose options to finance them.

Rahul Anand is an assistant director in the Asia-Pacific Department, where Hoda Selim is a senior economist.

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Global life expectancy at birth has increased from 46 years in 1950 to 74 in 2025, with a growing number of individuals reaching centenarian status. Credit: Shutterstock

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Jan 16 2026 (IPS)

Ageing and shrinking populations are becoming more prevalent in many countries around the world.

A growing number of governments are now grappling with these dual demographic challenges, which are becoming increasingly apparent. The demographic challenges posed by ageing and shrinking populations have significant impacts on society, affecting various economic, social, and political issues.

Governments are increasingly being forced to address the economic impact of supporting a growing number of retirees who are living longer with a decreasing number of workers. These changes are starting to have noticeable effects on pension programs, healthcare systems, and social safety nets.

In approximately 63 countries and areas, which make up about 28 percent of the world’s population of 8.2 billion in 2024, the size of their population has peaked before 2024 and is now shrinking. In 48 countries and areas, representing 10 percent of the world’s population in 2024, the population size is projected to peak within the next fifty years (Figure 1).

Source: United Nations.

In the remaining 126 countries or areas, accounting for 62% of the world’s population, their populations are expected to continue growing until 2055, potentially reaching a peak later in the 21st century or beyond.

In addition to populations shrinking, many countries have experienced a “historic reversal” in their age structures. This significant demographic milestone occurs when the percentage of individuals aged 65 and older exceeds the percentage of those aged 17 and younger. In simpler terms, it is when older adults outnumber children in a population.

The first historic reversal took place in Italy in 1995 during the 20th century. Five years later, it occurred in six more countries: Bulgaria, Germany, Greece, Japan, Portugal and Spain.

By 2025, 55 countries and areas had experienced a historic reversal, with more countries expected to undergo the same soon. Particularly striking are the demographics of Italy and Japan, where besides having shrinking populations, the percentage of people aged 65 and older is roughly twice as large as the percentage of those aged 17 and younger (Figure 2).

Source: United Nations.

The primary demographic forces driving the ageing and shrinking of populations are fertility rates below replacement levels, increased longevity, and limited immigration.

Globally, more than half of all countries and areas have a fertility rate below 2.1 births per woman, which is considered replacement level fertility.

In many cases, the fertility rates of countries in 2024 have dropped significantly below replacement levels. For example, South Korea (0.73), China (1.01), Italy (1.21), Japan (1.22), Canada (1.34), Germany (1.45), Russia (1.46), United Kingdom (1.55), United States (1.62), and France (1.64) all have fertility rates below replacement levels (Figure 3).

Source: United Nations.

Global life expectancy at birth has increased from 46 years in 1950 to 74 in 2025, with a growing number of individuals reaching centenarian status. In 50 countries and areas, immigration is expected to mitigate future declines in population size.

One action to address ageing and shrinking populations is to recognize demographic realities and tailor governmental policies and programs accordingly.

However, many governments are hesitant to accept the ageing and shrinking of their populations. These governments have implemented strategies aimed at combating these significant demographic trends.

Around 55 countries have adopted policies and incentives aimed at increasing their fertility rates in hopes of reversing the ageing and shrinking of their populations. However, considering recent global trends and various economic, social, developmental, cultural, and personal factors, it seems unlikely that today’s low fertility rates will return to the replacement level any time soon.

Various policies have been implemented to address ageing and shrinking populations. These policies are wide ranging and include increasing taxes, raising retirement ages, enhancing productivity, increasing female labor force participation, permitting medically assisted suicide, relying on immigration of workers, promoting equality between men and women, and reducing expenditures on pensions and healthcare for older adults (Table 1).

Source: Author’s compilation.

Most governments are investing significant financial resources in pensions and healthcare for older individuals. Some government officials argue that spending money on the elderly, while their workforce populations are declining, is not economically sound.

They believe that excessive expenditures on the older adults yield little on investment and is an unadvised economic practice. They suggest raising the retirement age to receive pensions and encouraging people to continue working in old age, particularly those who currently rely on government pensions, healthcare, and support.

By 2025, 55 countries and areas had experienced a historic reversal, with more countries expected to undergo the same soon. Particularly striking are the demographics of Italy and Japan, where besides having shrinking populations, the percentage of people aged 65 and older is roughly twice as large as the percentage of those aged 17 and younger

Instead of depending on government-funded programs to take care of older adults, some government officials believe families should care for their elderly and frail relatives as has been the case throughout much of the world’s history.

For the many older adults who currently rely on government pensions and assistance, some government officials believe these individuals should be encouraged to join the workforce and achieve financial independence.

While many governments provide or regulate pensions and healthcare, the government’s role remains a subject of political and economic debate in numerous countries with the level and type of government programs varying significantly across nations.

In contrast to the debate among governments, most citizens in these countries believe that their government should continue to provide pensions, healthcare, and assistance to older adults.

A survey conducted in six European countries (Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain) and the United States found that the majority of their populations recognize the future financial difficulties facing government pensions.

Most people in the surveyed countries felt that the value of the state pension is too low and opposed common reform options such as raising the retirement age or reducing funding for services for older people. Additionally, most non-retired individuals were not confident that they will live comfortably in retirement.

Ageing and shrinking populations are two significant demographic trends for the 21st century. These powerful and widespread demographics are presenting formidable challenges for many countries worldwide.

Instead of trying to revert to past demographic levels, governments should acknowledge the ageing and shrinking of their populations and act accordingly to address the many challenges that arise from these trends.

Joseph Chamie is a consulting demographer, a former director of the United Nations Population Division, and author of many publications on population matters.

Cardiologist Dr. Marwan Sultan, then Director of the Indonesian Hospital in north Gaza, in February 2025 showing damage to hospital equipment following an Israeli attack on the facility a few months prior. In July 2025, Dr. Sultan was killed in an Israeli strike on the apartment where he was sheltering with his family. Credit: PHR/GHRC

By Ed Holt
BRATISLAVA, Jan 14 2026 (IPS)

Israel must lift all restrictions on medicine, food and aid coming into Gaza, rights groups have demanded, as two reports released today (Jan 14) document how maternal and reproductive healthcare have been all but destroyed in the country.

In two separate reports released jointly, Physicians for Human Rights (with the Global Human Rights Clinic at the University of Chicago Law School) and Physicians for Human Rights–Israel (PHR-I) show how the war in Gaza has led to rising maternal and neonatal mortality, births under dangerous conditions, and the systematic destruction of health services for women in Gaza.

The reports from the two groups, which are independent organizations, provide both detailed clinical analysis of the collapse of Gaza’s health system and its medical consequences as well as firsthand testimonies from clinicians and pregnant and breastfeeding women in Gaza forced to live and care for their newborns in extreme conditions.

And the organizations say that with conditions improving only marginally for many women despite the current ceasefire, Israel must roll back restrictions placed on aid and immediately help ensure people in Gaza get access to the healthcare they need.

“Israel’s destruction of Gaza’s health infrastructure, combined with untreated malnutrition resulting from restrictions on food and medical supplies, including baby formula, has created an environment in which the fundamental biological processes of reproduction and survival have been systematically destroyed, resulting in known and foreseeable harm, pain, suffering, and death,” Sam Zarifi, Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) Executive Director, said.

“Israel must immediately allow food and essential medical material to enter Gaza with a proper medical plan for helping the besieged population,” he added.

Israeli military operations following Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, have left massive destruction across Gaza, including to healthcare facilities. According to UNICEF, 94 percent of hospitals have been damaged or destroyed.

Destroyed incubators and equipment at the Kamal Adwan Hospital Neonatal Intensive Care Unit in north Gaza, following the targeting and raid of the facility by the Israeli forces in December 2024. Credit: PHR/GHRC

Maternal and reproductive healthcare has suffered. Before the war, Gaza had eight neonatal intensive care units with 178 incubators. Today, the number of incubators has dropped by 70 percent. In the north, there were 105 incubators across three NICUs, now there are barely any functional units remaining, UNICEF told IPS.

It says that the numbers of low birth weight babies have nearly tripled compared to pre-war levels and the number of first-day deaths of babies increased by 75 percent.

The PHR and PHR-I reports paint a similar picture.

The PHR report, which focuses on the period between January 2025 and October 2025 when a ceasefire was agreed, details how between May and June last year, the Palestinian Ministry of Health reported a 41 percent decrease in the birth rate in Gaza compared to the same time period in 2022; there was a significant increase in miscarriages that affected more than 2,600 women, and 220 pregnancy-related deaths that occurred before delivery.

The ministry also reported a sharp increase in premature births and low birth weight cases; over 1,460 babies were reported to be born prematurely, while more than 2,500 were admitted to neonatal intensive care. Newborn deaths also increased, with at least 21 babies reported to have died on their first day of life.

Meanwhile, the PHR-I report includes personal testimonies illustrating the severe problems pregnant women and women with newborns have faced in Gaza during the war, from lacking safe routes to care and being forced to give birth in unsanitary, dangerous conditions to battling hunger and severe food shortages as they try to breastfeed their children.

One woman, Samah Muhammad Abu Mustafa, a 30-year-old mother of two from Khuza’a, Khan Youni, described how when her contractions began in the middle of the night, because there were no vehicles and very few ambulances, which are reserved for shelling or other critical emergencies, she had to walk a long distance through rain. When she eventually reached the hospital, she said it was “horrifying.”

“I swear, one woman gave birth in the corridor, and her baby died. It was very crowded, and the doctors worked nonstop. I felt as though I could give birth at any moment. After giving birth to my eldest daughter, I was told I should not deliver naturally again because my pelvis was too narrow. Despite this, the doctors said I would have to deliver naturally because a cesarean section required anesthesia, and there was not enough available. I stood for three hours until it was finally my turn, without sitting even for a moment,” she said.

But despite the October 2025 ceasefire, massive problems remain with women’s access to and the provision of, maternal and reproductive healthcare in Gaza.

“Maternal health units in Gaza are largely non-functional and face critical shortages of essential medicines, consumables, and equipment,” Lama Bakri, project coordinator in the Occupied Territories Department at PHR-I, told IPS.

“Neonatal and diagnostic equipment remains scarce or blocked, including portable incubators for premature and low-birth-weight newborns. Although some aid has entered since the ceasefire, these gaps are not being addressed at the scale required, and meaningful improvement in the immediate future remains unlikely.”

Malnutrition also remains a serious problem.

“The ceasefire has allowed us to significantly scale up our nutrition response, but we are still treating pregnant and breastfeeding women for acute malnutrition in alarmingly high numbers,” Ricardo Pires, Communication Manager, Division of Global Communications & Advocacy at UNICEF, told IPS.

He said that between July and September 2025 about 38 percent of pregnant women screened were diagnosed with acute malnutrition.

“In October alone, we admitted 8,300 pregnant and breastfeeding women for treatment, about 270 a day, in a place where there was no discernible malnutrition among this group before October 2023,” he added.

UNICEF has documented almost 6,800 children admitted for acute malnutrition treatment in November 2025 compared to 4,700 cases in November 2024. So far, the number of admitted cases more than doubled in 2025 compared to 2024: almost 89,000 admissions of children to date in 2025, compared to 40,000 cases in 2024, and almost none before 2023.

“What we’re seeing is that no child meets minimum dietary diversity standards, and two-thirds of children are surviving on just two food groups or less. Around 90 percent of caregivers reported their children had been sick in the previous two weeks, which compounds the malnutrition crisis,” Pires said.

And there are fears for the longer-term demographic future of Gaza given the damage to maternal and reproductive healthcare.

“For Gaza’s demographic future, the implications are serious. Even with reconstruction, we will be dealing with a generation of children who were scarred before they took their first breath, children who may face lifelong health complications, developmental challenges, and the effects of stunting. The rebuilding must start now, but we should be clear-eyed: the damage to maternal and newborn health will echo for years, potentially decades,” said Pires.

But others say that with cooperation between international actors and the right political will, the situation need not remain so dire.

“To rehabilitate the population after everything that has happened is going to be a real issue, [but] now there is a Board of Peace, the needs of pregnant women and maternal and reproductive healthcare can be prioritized,” Zarifi told IPS.

“The capacity and the will exist among Gazans and Gazan healthcare workers to rebuild the healthcare system, including maternal and reproductive health services,” added Bakri. “The primary obstacle is not technical or professional but political: Israel’s control over Gaza’s borders and the restrictions on the entry of essential equipment, medical supplies, and reconstruction materials. With unrestricted access to what is needed to rehabilitate hospitals, rebuild destroyed units, and restock essential medicines, recovery is entirely feasible. Whether maternal and reproductive healthcare can return to pre-war levels depends on sustained international pressure to allow that access.”

However, while both NGOs like PHR and PHR-I and others, alongside international bodies like the UN, stress that any recovery and reconstruction in Gaza requires the ceasefire to hold and consolidate, repeated violations underline its fragility, and the effect that has on women.

Meanwhile, PHR and PHR-I point out that extreme weather and ongoing Israeli restrictions on medicine and food getting to Gaza to this day continue to severely affect pregnant women, new mothers, and babies. On top of this, Israel has also announced it will bar 37 international aid groups from working in Gaza, potentially compounding the problems.

Bakri said such measures were jeopardizing what small gains had been made since the ceasefire and “raise serious concerns about whether the situation can improve.”

“Even after the ceasefire, while bombardment has decreased, the reality these women face remains catastrophic – not only for their bodies and well-being but for the survival of the entire society,” said Bakri.

Zarifi added, “We are worried that the restrictions placed by Israel on some of the major actors in the humanitarian response will hamper access to assistance for those that need it. We have raised questions with the Israeli government as to why specific medicines are not allowed to be brought into Gaza and they say that they are not stopping them from being brought in but they can be brought in by commercial means. That is hard for people who can barely put any money together. These medicines should definitely be coming in through humanitarian channels.”

He also highlighted how important the issue of accountability is in ensuring any progress is made in rebuilding healthcare in Gaza and also limiting the probability of similar devastation in the future.

Both reports concluded that the harms caused by Israeli attacks are not isolated incidents but part of an ongoing pattern of systematic damage to the health of women and their children in Gaza, amounting to reproductive violence.

Israel has denied this and said that attacks on hospitals in Gaza have been because the medical facilities are being used by Hamas, and it has maintained that its forces adhere to international law.

While under international law healthcare facilities have special protection even in war, and attacks on them are prohibited, that protection is lost if they are deemed to fulfill criteria to be considered military objectives, such as housing militaries and arms.

However, any attack on them must still comply with the fundamental principles of distinction, proportionality and precautions in attack and failure to respect any of these principles constitutes a breach of international humanitarian law, according to the UN.

“These attacks are part of a deliberate policy designed to create a domino effect of suffering. From starvation and militarized aid distribution by the GHF, to lack of access to clean water, repeated displacement orders, living in shelters under continuous bombardment, and exposure to infections, disease, and harsh weather, the attacks on maternal and reproductive healthcare are another piece of this puzzle. Together, these conditions were created to systematically destroy the fabric of life in Gaza and reduce the population’s ability to survive,” said Bakri.

“The Israeli government has justified attacks on healthcare facilities by saying this was a problem caused by Hamas. We haven’t had an indication of this but it might be true. But in any case there has to be an investigation of these incidents and we hope the Israeli government will carry out such an investigation,” said Zarifi.

“But what is really alarming to us is that the norms prohibiting attacks on healthcare have been repeatedly violated, and there are also laws governing the protection of women and children that appear to have been violated. The only thing that makes these norms work is accountability. There has to be accountability for what happened, as it is the only way we can ensure that what has happened won’t happen in other conflicts. Impunity is watched by other actors around the world,” he added.

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Donald Trump, President of the United States of America, addresses the general debate of the General Assembly’s eightieth session in 2025. Credit: UN Photo/Evan Schneider.

By Oritro Karim
UNITED NATIONS, Jan 8 2026 (IPS)

President Donald Trump’s executive order to stop United States support for 66 international organizations, including 31 United Nations (UN) groups, has faced strong opposition from these organizations, the global community, humanitarian experts, and climate advocates, who are concerned about the negative effects on global cooperation, sustainable development, and international peace and security.

This executive order follows earlier withdrawals from the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), and the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). The United States has recently reduced its funding for foreign aid organizations.

The majority of the affected bodies in this executive order are organizations that center around issues in climate change, labor, peacekeeping, migration, and civic space conditions. In a statement from the U.S. Department of State, it is confirmed that Trump’s review of these organizations found them to be “wasteful, ineffective, and harmful.”

The executive order primarily affects organizations that address climate change, labor rights, peacekeeping, migration, and civic space conditions. In a statement, the department described the organizations, calling them vehicles for “progressive ideologies” funded by American taxpayers and misaligned with United States’ national interests.

“The Trump Administration has found these institutions to be redundant in their scope, mismanaged, unnecessary, wasteful, poorly run, captured by the interests of actors advancing their agendas contrary to our own, or a threat to our nation’s sovereignty, freedoms, and general prosperity,” said United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio. “President Trump is clear: It is no longer acceptable to be sending these institutions the blood, sweat, and treasure of the American people, with little to nothing to show for it. The days of billions of dollars in taxpayer money flowing to foreign interests at the expense of our people are over.”

The order instructs all executive departments and agencies to begin implementing the withdrawals immediately. For the affected UN agencies, this entails ending United States participation and halting funding. Rubio also confirmed that the review of additional international organizations is still underway.

Humanitarian experts and spokespersons for many of the affected entities have voiced alarm and condemnation with President Trump’s order, warning of severe consequences for climate action, human rights, peacebuilding efforts, multilateral governance, and global crisis-response systems—particularly at a time of mounting international instability.

“Today, we are witnessing a complete shift from global cooperation towards transactional relations,” said Yamide Dagnet, Senior International Vice President at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC).

“It is becoming less about shared principles, rule of law, and solidarity, thereby risking more global instability. By choosing to run away from addressing some of the biggest environmental, economic, health, and security threats on the planet, the United States of America stands to lose a lot. With diminishing credibility and competitiveness in the industries of the future, the United States will be missing out on job creation and innovation, ceding scientific and technological leadership to other countries,” Dagnet said.

She called on world leaders to commit to multilateralism.

“The world is bigger than the United States—and so are the solutions to our problems, which require global cooperation more than ever, including among states, provinces, and cities globally. This is the moment when world leaders need to resolutely commit to multilateral collaboration if we’re going to overcome these global threats to ensure a safe and sustainable future for all.”

Many have also criticized the United States’ à la carte approach to meeting its international obligations, only supporting the operations and agencies that align with President Trump’s priorities.

“I think what we’re seeing is the crystallization of the United States approach to multilateralism, which is ‘my way or the highway,’” said Daniel Forti, the head of UN affairs at the International Crisis Group. “It’s a very clear vision of wanting international cooperation on Washington’s own terms.”

The Intergovernmental Science Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) said it regretted “the deeply disappointing news of the United States’ intention to withdraw its participation in IPBES, along with more than 60 other international organizations and bodies.”

Dr. David Obura, Chair of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), said the U.S. was a founding member and “scientists, policymakers and stakeholders—including Indigenous Peoples and local communities—from the United States have been among the most engaged contributors to the work of IPBES since its establishment in 2012, making valuable contributions to objective science-based assessments of the state of the planet for people and nature.”

Apart from their contributions to IPBES, “decision-makers in the United States—at all levels and in all spheres of society—have also been among the most prolific users of the work produced by IPBES to help better inform policy, regulations, investments and future research.”

Obura thanked the United States for their contribution but noted that the withdrawal would have a massive impact on IPBES and the planet.

“Unfortunately, we cannot withdraw from the fact that more than 1 million species of plants and animals face extinction. Nor can we change the fact that the global economy is losing as much as USD 25 trillion per year in environmental impacts, or restore the missed opportunities of not acting now to generate more than USD 10 trillion in business opportunity value and 395 million jobs by 2030.”

Historically, the United States has been the largest financial contributor to the UN, providing approximately 22 percent of the organization’s regular budget and roughly 28 percent of all peacekeeping funds.

The withdrawal of United States support from 31 UN bodies is expected to trigger substantial budget shortfalls, cutbacks in humanitarian staffing, and the loss of critical technical expertise supplied by its personnel. These setbacks are likely to hinder progress toward the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), reduce food assistance and medical services for people in protracted crises, and embolden authoritarian governments to resist humanitarian oversight and intervention.

“The US decision to disengage from dozens of United Nations programs and agencies, along with other international bodies, is just President Trump’s latest assault on human rights protections and the global rule of law,” said Louis Charbonneau, UN director at Human Rights Watch (HRW).

“Whether withdrawing from the Human Rights Council or defunding the UN Population Fund, which helps millions of women and girls around the world, this administration has been trying to destroy the very same human rights institutions that the US helped build over the last 80 years. UN member countries should resist the US campaign to demolish tools they use to uphold human rights and ensure that vital UN programs have the funding and political support they need.”

At a press briefing at the UN Headquarters, Stéphane Dujarric, spokesperson for the UN Secretary-General António Guterres, informed reporters of the UN’s reaction to the United States withdrawal, emphasizing that the UN remains committed to assisting people in need regardless of United States participation

“As we have consistently underscored, assessed contributions to the United Nations regular budget and peacekeeping budget, as approved by the General Assembly, are a legal obligation under the UN Charter for all Member States, including the United States,” said Dujarric.

“All United Nations entities will go on with the implementation of their mandates as given by Member States. The United Nations has a responsibility to deliver for those who depend on us.  We will continue to carry out our mandates with determination.”

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Despite impressive global declines in mortality rates, life expectancies at birth vary significantly among countries. Credit: Shutterstock

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Jan 7 2026 (IPS)

While death is inevitable for everyone, the timing of “The Appointment in Samarra” varies significantly among and within populations. Fortunately, mortality levels of human populations have declined significantly worldwide in recent years, leading to increased survival rates and delayed appointments in Samarra.

For example, in the mid-20th century, life expectancies at birth for males and females were 45 and 48 years, respectively. Today, males and females have life expectancies at birth of 71 and 76 years, respectively, which is an increase of more than 25 years. Additionally, females generally have higher life expectancies than males across countries (Figure 1).

Source: United Nations.

Despite impressive global declines in mortality rates, life expectancies at birth vary significantly among countries. Currently, life expectancies at birth for males and females range from highs of about 82 and 87 years, respectively, in Japan and Italy, to lows of approximately 55 and 57 years, respectively, in Nigeria and the Central African Republic.

Inequities in life expectancies at birth persist across different age groups. For example, by the age of 65, country differences in life expectancy remain substantial. In Japan and Italy, life expectancies for males and females at age 65 are approximately 20 and 24 years, respectively. In contrast, the life expectancies for males and females at age 65 in Nigeria and the Central African Republic are about 12 and 13 years, respectively.

Similarly, infant mortality rates vary greatly among countries around the world. The mortality rates of infants range from lows of approximately 2 deaths per 1,000 births in Japan and Italy to highs over 30 times greater, with about 68 deaths per 1,000 births in Nigeria and the Central African Republic.

Longer life expectancies for the world’s population have also led to an increase in the number of centenarians.

In 1950, there were nearly 15,000 centenarians worldwide, making up 0.001% of the global population. Today, there are approximately 630,000 centenarians, accounting for close to 0.01% of the world’s population. By 2050, the number of centenarians is projected to reach 2.6 million, representing around 0.03% of the world’s population (Figure 2).

Source: United Nations.

There are many important factors that influence when and how the appointment in Samarra will occur. These factors include place of birth, residence, sex, socio-economic status, housing, healthcare, nutrition, diet, education, friends, exercise, genetics, disease prevalence, economic stability, public health, injuries, mental health, environmental conditions, political stability, human rights, social support, sanitation, substance use, lifestyle choices, parenting, personal habits, poverty, and violence (Table 1).

Declines in fertility rates have followed mortality rate declines, commonly described as the demographic transition. The fertility rate of the world’s population has fallen from a high of about 5.3 births per woman in the early 1960s to 2.2 births per woman today.

More than half of all countries and areas worldwide have a fertility rate below the replacement level of 2.1 births per woman. In many of these countries, deaths outnumber births, resulting in negative rates of population growth.

For example, in China, deaths began outnumbering births about five years ago. This trend is expected to continue for the rest of the 21st century, leading to population decline and the demographic ageing of the Chinese population.

The timing and circumstances of appointments in Samarra differ among the populations of more developed and less developed countries. People in the latter group are more likely to die from communicable diseases than from noncommunicable diseases, which are chronic conditions typically associated with older, aging populations and lifestyle factors.

Among more developed countries, major causes of death include heart disease, cancer, stroke, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and lower respiratory infections. Other leading causes are Alzheimer’s and other dementia, tuberculosis, diarrheal diseases, HIV/AIDS, and external causes and injuries.

Currently, life expectancies at birth for males and females range from highs of about 82 and 87 years, respectively, in Japan and Italy, to lows of approximately 55 and 57 years, respectively, in Nigeria and the Central African Republic

Additionally, in many countries, cancer has replaced heart disease as the leading cause of death. The most common cancers are breast, lung, colon, rectum, and prostate cancer.

Approximately a third of cancer deaths are due to tobacco use, high body mass index, alcohol consumption, low fruit and vegetable intake, and lack of physical activity. Air pollution is also an important risk factor for lung cancer. Many cancers can be cured if detected early and treated effectively.

In many less developed countries, major causes of death include lower respiratory diseases, stroke, heart disease, malaria, and pre-term birth conditions. Other important causes include diarrheal diseases, tuberculosis, birth trauma, and HIV/AIDS.

Another major cause of death in recent years has been the coronavirus or COVID-19. The World Health Organization declared it a global pandemic on 11 March 2020, and it ended in May 2023, but remains an ongoing health threat. The pandemic resulted in over 7 million officially reported deaths worldwide, but the estimated excess morality is significantly higher, ranging between 18 and 35 million.

A crucial factor influencing the timing of appointments in Samarra is the availability of universal health coverage. According to the World Health Organization, universal health coverage ensures that every individual in a country has access to a wide range of health services, from emergency treatments to palliative care, without facing financial difficulties.

As of 2024, 73 out of the 195 countries worldwide were reported to offer some form of universal health coverage, which covers around two-thirds of the global population of 8.2 billion.

Among more developed nations, the United States stands out as a notable exception for not providing universal health care to all its citizens. In 2024, private health insurance coverage remained more prevalent than public coverage, with 66% of the U.S. population being covered. Additionally, the U.S. was noted for having the highest healthcare spending figure per capita in the world.

A significant debate surrounding the appointments in Samarra revolves around the right to die or medically assisted suicide. The differing perspectives about assisted suicide focus on the balance between individual autonomy and the sanctity of life.

Some believe that individuals experiencing unbearable suffering, often due to a terminal illness or incurable condition, should have the legal right and control to decide on medically assisted suicide or voluntary euthanasia. In contrast, others argue that assisted suicide devalues human life and opens the door to potential abuse. They also emphasize the importance of palliative care for those facing illness or personal struggles.

Medically assisted suicide is legal under specific circumstances in a limited number of countries. Those places include Australia, Austria. Belgium, Canada, Colombia, Ecuador, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Spain, Switzerland, and twelve states in the United States.

In order to be eligible for medical assistance in dying, an individual typically must meet certain criteria. These criteria may include having a terminal illness or disability, being of sound mind, expressing a voluntary desire to die, and being capable of self-administering the lethal dose.

While the appointment in Samarra is inevitable for every human being, the timing of when this appointment will occur remains a topic of debate among the scientific community.

Some believe that there is a fixed limit to human life span, largely attributed to the gradual processes of biological ageing. They stress the implausibility of radical life extension for humans in the 21st century.

On the other hand, some argue that there is no conclusive evidence that the limit of human life span has been reached. The oldest supercentenarian on record, Jeanne Calment of France, lived to be 122 years and 164 days. Some experts predict that this current record of 122 years will be surpassed by the end of the 21st century, possibly even reaching 130 years.

In conclusion, the mortality rates of human populations have decreased globally in recent years, leading to improved chances of survival, longer life expectancies, and a growing number of centenarians. However, the timing and circumstances of the inevitable appointment in Samarra vary, with populations in more developed countries continuing to experience lower death rates and longer life expectancies compared to populations in less developed countries.

Joseph Chamie is a consulting demographer, a former director of the United Nations Population Division, and author of many publications on population matters.

The maternity ward at Kharkiv City Multifunctional Hospital No.25. Credit: UNFPA/Ukraine

By Ed Holt
BRATISLAVA, Jan 7 2026 (IPS)

“It was an emergency caesarean section when the life of the pregnant woman was at risk. We did the operation with just flashlights and no water, and against a backdrop of constant explosions,” says Dr Oleksandr Zhelezniakov, Director of the Obstetrics Department at Kharkiv Regional Clinical Hospital, in eastern Ukraine.

He is recalling what he says was “one of the most difficult” medical procedures he has been involved in since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of his country.

But it was far from the only time he has had to work in extreme conditions while his city is pounded by Russian shelling. In fact, he says, it has become routine for him and his colleagues.

“The current reality is that, given we are in a frontline city, we work like this almost every day, because the alarms never stop and we hear explosions almost every day,” he tells IPS.

“You just do what you have to do to save a life, to save the future. In such moments, you only think about saving a life. We work [in these conditions] because life must always prevail,” he says.

Staff look at the beginnings of construction of a bunkerised facility at Kharkiv City Multifunctional Hospital No. 25. Credit: UNFPA/Ukraine

Zhelezniakov’s hospital has, like many other medical facilities in Ukraine, been repeatedly attacked and damaged since the start of the war. The World Health Organisation (WHO) had documented more than 2,700 attacks on Ukrainian healthcare facilities since February 24, 2024.

These have included attacks on more than 80 maternal healthcare facilities – with devastating consequences for maternal health, as recently released data has shown.

According to analysis by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) released in December, there has been a sharp rise in the risk of dying in pregnancy or childbirth in Ukraine as the conflict grinds on.

The agency says repeated strikes on hospitals and the breakdown of essential services are forcing women to give birth in increasingly dangerous conditions, and health workers have warned that a combination of violence, chronic stress, displacement and widespread disruption of maternity care is driving a surge in pregnancy complications and preventable deaths.

Its analysis of national data shows a 37-percent increase in the maternal mortality rate from 2023 to 2024 – the most recent full year of national data available. In 2023, Ukraine recorded 18.9 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births. In 2024, that figure rose to 25.9. The organisation says most of these are preventable deaths, reflecting a health system operating under extreme strain.

It said it had also seen sharp increases in severe pregnancy and childbirth complications. Uterine ruptures — among the most dangerous obstetric emergencies — have risen by 44 per cent. Hypertensive disorders of pregnancy have increased by more than 12 per cent, while severe postpartum haemorrhage has risen by nearly 9 per cent – from 2023 to 2024. Delays in accessing care, stress, displacement and disrupted referral pathways are key contributing factors.

Meanwhile, the situation in frontline regions is particularly acute. In Kherson, premature births are almost double the national average, and the region has the highest stillbirth rate in the country, according to UNFPA.

It cites contributing factors including stress, insecurity and difficulties in accessing care, which can lead to preterm labour and premature rupture of membranes.

Another indicator of system strain is the Caesarean section rate. Nationally, the rate now exceeds 28 per cent, already above recommended levels. In frontline regions, the figures are among the highest in Europe: 46 per cent in Kherson and approximately 32 per cent in Odesa, Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv. These high rates often reflect the need for doctors and women to time deliveries around short windows of relative safety and can additionally show an increased pregnancy complication rate that requires surgical intervention, according to UNFPA officials.

“Attacks [on healthcare, including maternity and neonatal facilities] have had measurable and severe consequences for maternal health. Ukraine is entering another winter under conditions that sharply increase risks for pregnant women, newborns and the health workers who care for them,” Isaac Hurskin, Head of Communications, UNFPA in Ukraine, told IPS.

In early December, a maternity hospital in Kherson, a facility supported by UNFPA, was struck by artillery fire. During the strike, hospital staff moved women in labour and newborns into a bunkered maternity ward—one of many such facilities constructed by the government with help from groups like UNFPA to protect mothers and babies during active hostilities.

While everyone survived the attack and a baby girl was born in the bunker during the shelling, Hurskin said it was “a stark illustration of the conditions under which pregnancy and childbirth are now taking place — conditions no woman or health worker should ever have to face”.

But the devastation wrought by the war in Ukraine is also impacting wider reproductive health.

IPS has spoken to women in Ukraine who have admitted they are avoiding getting pregnant because of concerns about their ability to access maternal healthcare safely but also the conditions in which they may have to raise an infant.

“Women in conflict-affected areas have specific reproductive needs. It is very hard to meet them when a maternity hospital gets bombed on a regular basis, or when energy infrastructure is targeted, limiting the functionality of hospitals and forcing pregnant women to unequipped hospital shelters. A woman considering getting pregnant needs to make a decision based on these factors – whether a hospital is safe, whether she can have access to services, and whether she is able to care for the child afterwards, with no electricity, heating, or water at home,” Uliana Poltavets, International Advocacy and Ukraine Program Coordinator at Physicians for Human Rights (PHR), told IPS.

“This is a trend which is being observed,” added Zhelezniakov. “Women fear not only for their lives and the lives of their unborn children during childbirth under shelling but also an uncertain future—a lack of safe housing, work, and normal conditions for raising a child. This is a rational fear in the irrational conditions of war. It is one of the reasons for the sharp decline in the birth rate.”

But he added that conversely, the effects of the war were impacting women’s ability to conceive.

“Chronic stress, high cortisol levels, anxiety, and sleep disorders directly affect hormonal balance and reproductive function. Constant stress also leads to hormonal imbalances (dysfunction of the hypothalamic-pituitary-ovarian axis). This causes an increase in cases of secondary infertility, premature ovarian failure, and endometriosis. We are already seeing an increase in the number of pathological menopauses in young women,” he said.

These threats to fertility and maternal health come at a time when Ukraine is facing a demographic crisis.

According to UNFPA, since 2014, when Russia illegally annexed Crimea and supported separatist paramilitary movements in eastern Ukraine, the country has lost an estimated 10 million people through displacement, mortality and outward migration. Fertility has fallen to below one child per woman — one of the lowest rates globally.

It says that rising maternal deaths, increasing complications and pervasive uncertainty about the safety of childbirth reinforce one another, with long-term consequences for families, communities and national recovery.

“This is not only a humanitarian emergency. It is a demographic crisis with implications that will extend far beyond the end of hostilities. Protecting maternal health is central to Ukraine’s long-term recovery and future stability,” said Hurskin.

Indeed, examples from other recent conflicts where there has been widescale destruction of healthcare have shown the long-term effects of war on maternal and reproductive healthcare long after they have finished, from problems with rebuilding damaged and destroyed facilities, ongoing displacement, and continued shortages of medical staff just some of the barriers to women being able to access services.

“Look at Syria, for example. The healthcare system is being built back up, there is rebuilding of facilities, things are improving, but it will take decades to get back to where it was before. And maternal healthcare tends to be deprioritised both during and after a conflict – resources tend to go to other areas such as emergency and trauma care. Women in Syria will have problems with accessing maternal healthcare for years and years to come,” an expert on healthcare in war zones working for an international human rights group, who spoke on condition of anonymity for security reasons, told IPS.

Zhelezniakov admits that a worsening of the demographic crisis in Ukraine is inevitable.

“The expectation is that it will get worse. The destruction of the maternal health care system only exacerbates existing problems caused by the war: the migration of women and children abroad, loss of life, economic instability, and psychological pressure,” he says.

But he adds that even now measures can be taken to improve maternal healthcare, including strengthening primary care, improving digitalisation (e-health systems), investment in prevention, mental health support programmes, environmental improvement, legislative regulation, and raising awareness of reproductive health to reduce mortality and disability, among others.

Developing international cooperation by creating “medical hubs” in relatively safe regions with the support of international partners, such as UNFPA and WHO, to ensure services, would also help.

“Even during active hostilities, we can and must work to adapt the system,” he says.

He also vows that, no matter what happens, he and other medical staff will not stop their work, recalling the emergency caesarean section performed by flashlight as shells rained down on Kharkiv.

“The birth of a child in such conditions is always a miracle and a powerful motivator to continue working, despite everything,” he says.

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Currently, more than half of all countries and areas worldwide have a fertility rate below the replacement level of 2.1 births per woman. Credit: Shutterstock

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Dec 15 2025 (IPS)

Will low fertility rates return to the replacement level of 2.1 births per woman any time soon? A simple answer to this vital demographic question is: unlikely.

A detailed answer about future fertility rates involves the complex interaction of various economic, social, developmental, cultural, and personal factors that influence fertility levels.

Among those factors are economic insecurity, financial pressures, marriage rates, childbearing ages, child mortality levels, contraceptive use, higher education, labor force participation, lifestyle choices, personal goals, concerns about the future, and finding a suitable spouse or partner for family life.

During the recent past, the world’s fertility rate declined significantly from 5.3 births per woman in 1963 to 2.3 births in 2023.

Currently, more than half of all countries and areas worldwide have a fertility rate below the replacement level of 2.1 births per woman. Among these low fertility countries are the world’s ten largest national economies (Figure 1).

Source: United Nations.

In contrast to countries with low fertility rates, sub-Saharan African countries have high fertility rates. Together these countries account for about one-third of the world’s current annual births, with that proportion projected to increase to nearly 40% by the mid-century.

Currently, two dozen countries in sub-Saharan Africa have fertility rates of 4 or more births per woman, with half of them having rates of 5 or more births per woman. Some of these countries, such as Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Somalia, have the world’s highest fertility rates at about 6 births per woman (Figure 2).

Source: United Nations.

In countries with low fertility, many young adults choose to prioritize economic security over starting a family. This shift in priorities reflects the financial burden that comes with household expenses, such as housing, food, transportation, childcare, and education.

The average annual costs of raising a child can vary significantly from country to country because of differences in income, family structures, living expenses, and government subsidies. However, couples generally perceive raising children as a challenging and costly endeavor, given the expenses associated with housing, food, childcare, and education.

Besides the increasing age at which couples are choosing to marry, there has been a global decline in early childbearing. In more developed regions and in many less developed countries, such as China and India, the mean age of childbearing has risen by approximately three years since 1995.

Decreases in teenage pregnancies have also played a role in contributing to low fertility rates in many countries. For example, between 1994 and 2024, the worldwide adolescent birth rate declined from 74 to 38 births per 1,000 females aged 15 to 19 years.

Considering recent global trends and significant economic, social, developmental, cultural, and personal factors, it appears unlikely that today’s low fertility rates will return to the replacement level any time soon

In addition to delaying childbearing, many women are having fewer babies, with a significant number choosing not to have children at all. Although figures vary by region and generation, childlessness levels are rising, with approximately 40% or more of women by age 30 in developed countries remaining childless.

Using contraceptive methods is another significant contributor to low fertility rates. Various contraceptive options are available to prevent unintended pregnancy, including temporary or reversible and permanent methods. Worldwide, about half of women of reproductive age in 2022 were estimated to be using contraceptives, with 90% of them using a modern contraceptive method.

Higher education and increased female labor force participation are two additional factors contributing to low fertility rates. These factors raise the opportunity costs of childbearing, encourage delayed marriage and childbearing, and shift personal life priorities to career and personal development.

Over the past fifty years, the enrollment of women in higher education has increased worldwide. Women currently make up the majority of higher education students in 114 countries, while men out-number women in 57 countries. With respect to earning a bachelor’s degree, women have reached parity with men.

In many low fertility countries, there has a notable rise in the number of women joining the workforce. This trend is clear in more developed nations, where the percentage of economically active women has seen a significant increase in recent times. For instance, in Spain, the proportion of women in the labor force has more than doubled over the last fifty years, growing from around one in four to over half.

Another major factor contributing to low fertility rates is the significant global declines in infant and child mortality. Over the past fifty years, the global infant mortality rate has decreased from approximately 90 deaths per 1,000 births to 27 deaths and the mortality rate of children under age 5 has decreased from 132 deaths per 1,000 live births to 36 deaths.

Because of low fertility rates, many countries are experiencing more deaths than births, resulting in negative rates of population growth. These sustained negative rates of population growth are leading to population decline and demographic ageing.

The governments of many low fertility countries are implementing pro-natalist policies, incentives, and programs to increase birth rates. While these policies and programs may have some success in increasing low fertility rates slightly, historical data show that once a fertility rate drops below the replacement level, particularly to 1.5 births per woman or less, it remains low.

Population projections for countries with low fertility rates do not expect a return to the replacement level in the near future.

The world’s fertility rate is expected to continue declining throughout the 21st century. By 2100, the global fertility rate is projected to be below the replacement level at 1.8 births per woman.

The country population projections made by national governments and international organizations assume that fertility rates will remain below the replacement level. Consequently, many countries are projected to experience population decline by the mid-century (Figure 3).

Source: United Nations.

In 50 countries and areas, immigration is expected to help reduce the projected population decline caused by low fertility rates. However, without international migration, some countries, like Canada, France, the United Kingdom, and the United States, are also projected to see a decrease in population by 2050.

While many countries are experiencing a demographic struggle over international migration, the proportions of immigrants in these countries are reaching record highs. In the European Union, for example, the proportion of the foreign-born population is about 14%, a significant increase from 10% in 2010.

Similarly, in the United States, the foreign-born proportion is at a record high of nearly 16%, several times greater than the low of 5% in 1970. Additionally, in Canada, the foreign-born proportion has risen to a record high of close to a quarter of its population, surpassing the previous record of 22% in 1921. Australia also has a significant foreign-born population, especially recently from India and China, reaching close to a third of its population, substantially higher than the 24% in 2004.

Along with population declines, coupled in many instances with increased immigration, countries are also experiencing demographic ageing. The once youthful populations of the recent past are now being replaced by much older populations with increasing proportions of these individuals in retirement. Once again, as with population decline, the projected populations of many countries by the middle of the century would be older without international migration (Figure 4).

Source: United Nations.

In summary, considering recent global trends and significant economic, social, developmental, cultural, and personal factors, it appears unlikely that today’s low fertility rates will return to the replacement level any time soon.

As a result, ongoing low fertility rates are leading to population decline, demographic ageing, and, in many instances, the politically contentious issue of increased levels of the foreign-born population. Instead of hoping for a return to the demographics of the recent past, countries need to recognize the probable future demographics and confront the many challenges that arise from them.

Joseph Chamie is a consulting demographer, a former director of the United Nations Population Division, and author of many publications on population matters.

Even as their rights are under attack, women across the world are leading the charge to expand access to justice. Credit: UNDP Somalia

By Revai Makanje Aalbaek and Sarah Douglas
NEW YORK, Nov 18 2025 (IPS)

Even as their rights face growing threats, women across the globe are driving progress. From courtrooms to communities, women’s leadership is shaping peace, justice and development—often against the odds. In the face of conflict, exclusion and inequality, we continue to see powerful stories of hope, resilience and change. We are inspired by women who mediate local disputes, push for new laws and champion the rights of survivors, holding communities together.

These stories remind us that we achieve our best results when working together, especially when the task ahead is the elimination of deeply rooted and widespread barriers. The UNDP and UN Women Gender Justice Platform – made possible thanks to generous support from Germany, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom—continues to support access to justice and women’s leadership in rule of law institutions in over 45 countries globally, proving that cross border solidarity can dismantle even the most entrenched inequality.

1. Women at the forefront of transitional justice in South Sudan

In the context of the 2018 Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan (R-ARCSS) and its 2022 Roadmap Agreement, peacebuilding in South Sudan is ongoing, including efforts to deliver transitional justice and community reconciliation.

To safeguard women’s participation in decision-making in these processes, the Gender Justice Platform has supported key legal advancements. In 2024, South Sudan’s parliament adopted two laws guaranteeing that women have a seat and a voice in the Commission for Truth, Reconciliation and Healing and the Compensation and Reparations Authority.

The laws explicitly recognize the distinct impacts of conflict on women, offering special protection for victims and witnesses, particularly for women, children and persons with disabilities.

The laws were informed by recommendations put forward by South Sudanese women as a result of a consultation on gender-responsive and survivor-centred transitional justice, co-hosted in June 2023 by the Gender Justice Platform.

These laws mark a major step toward ensuring that women, including survivors of conflict-related sexual violence, shape how truth-telling occurs and reparations are delivered, and that women’s leadership is woven into South Sudan’s journey toward justice, reconciliation and peace.

Through the Gender Justice Platform, UNDP and UN Women have empowered women to participate in transitional justice processes in more than 20 countries, including Colombia, Ethiopia, Liberia and Mali.

2. Expanding access to justice in Tanzania

In Tanzania, women and underrepresented groups, including women with disabilities, often face deep-rooted barriers to justice. To address them, UN Women worked closely with the Ministry of Constitution and Legal Affairs, boosting its legal aid and awareness campaign to reach more than 56,000 people, half of them women and girls. Critical issues were on the agenda, including land and property disputes, inheritance, family matters and gender-based violence.

In Tanzania, paralegals and social workers deliver legal aid and raise awareness on women’s rights. Credit: UN Women/Hanna Mtango

For lasting impact, the Gender Justice Platform empowered local champions – paralegals, aid providers and community social workers – to deliver legal aid and raise awareness on women’s rights, justice and social norms.

Complementing this, strategic training for judges on gender responsive sentencing ensures that women’s needs are considered when cases reach court. Together, these efforts show that sustainable justice must integrate both formal and informal systems to be effective and trusted.

3. Women mediators in Yemen help women resolve legal disputes

The space for women’s rights is restricted in Yemen. As around 80 percent of disputes in the country are resolved through community-based mechanisms, UNDP supported women mediators and paralegals to provide services though these customary and informal networks.

In 2024 alone, women mediators and paralegals resolved over 1,200 local disputes, primarily family-related, in partnership with local civil society organizations such as the Youth Horizon Foundation, making this initiative a critical lifeline for those most in need.

Women paralegals are working as insider-mediators to build peace in a bottom-up manner, contributing to the overall stabilization of the country.

Through the Gender Justice Platform, UNDP assisted about 300 women held in a prison, many of whom are there with their children. With UNICEF and civil society, UNDP advocated to facilitate the release and reintegration of wrongfully detained women, restoring dignity and family connections.

One woman, for example, spent an additional seven years in the prison after completing her sentence, as no one from her family would come for her. With UNDP support, Yemen Women Union (YWU) reconciled the woman with her family, and she was released.

4. Championing women’s leadership in South East Asia

In courtrooms across Southeast Asia, women judges are reshaping justice. In Indonesia, Lao People’s Democratic Republic and Thailand, they are building mentoring networks to ensure the law reflects women’s lived realities.

Their enthusiasm and professionalism sparked the Women’s Leadership in the Judiciary initiative, along with a storytelling campaign through which women judges share their personal stories.

“To ensure gender justice,” explains Sapana Pradhan Malla of Nepal, “our first step was to make sure that the law reflects women’s experience and perspective, without exclusion or discrimination against women.”

By amplifying women’s voices, the Gender Justice Platform is nurturing a new generation of women leaders who are supporting the transformation of the judiciary from within.

5. Civil society advancing gender justice in Colombia

The Gender Justice Platform supports women’s civil society organizations that translate global commitments into local, feminist action, ensuring survivors’ voices shape every step of the justice process. In Colombia, the Alliance Initiative of Women for Peace brings together 248 organizations of survivors, activists and lawyers.

In 2024, with support from the Gender Justice Platform, the Alliance worked alongside survivors of sexual violence and the Special Jurisdiction for Peace, Colombia’s transitional justice tribunal, to ensure full and restorative participation.

As Alliance Director Angela Cerón Lasprilla explains, “Knowing I was not the only survivor, that what happened was not my fault and that I am a human being, that I matter—it’s only possible to acknowledge that if you have the support.”

Advancing women’s rights benefits everyone. Evidence shows that the advancement of women’s rights fosters equality, economic growth and opportunities for all. When women have unimpeded access to their rights, including justice and security, societies have a better chance to prosper, live in peace and enjoy development.

Explore the 2024 annual report of the Gender Justice Platform to see and celebrate what we achieved together. Along with our partners, we will continue to foster change for women and their active participation in justice efforts, guided by the Women, Peace and Security agenda.

Revai Makanje Aalbaek is Senior Advisor on Justice and Security, UNDP Crisis Bureau;
Sarah Douglas is Deputy Chief, Peace, Security and Resilience Section, UN Women

Source: UNDP

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Dating apps generated over $6 billion in 2024, with North America accounting for 50% of global revenue, Europe 23%, and adoption climbing across Asia-Pacific and Africa. Credit: Shutterstock

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Nov 6 2025 (IPS)

Dating websites, mobile apps, social networks, and cell phones offer numerous opportunities for dating, developing relationships, having encounters, and finding partners with more and more people relying on these platforms. However, modern technologies with their scale, speed and easy have also brought about dating challenges for both men and women.

These challenges include unrealistic expectations, emotional disconnection, feelings of inadequacy, superficiality, choice paralysis, decision fatigue, misrepresentation, privacy concerns, harassment, stalking, threats, scams, situationships, catfishing, orbiting, benching, pocketing, love bombing, cushioning, ghosting, submarining, and breadcrumbing.

Dating has evolved significantly from face-to-face social encounters, often within a family-centric process, to today’s technologically driven individualistic experiences. In much of the past and continuing in some traditional societies, courtship was typically a structured process focused on finding a suitable marriage partner for the purpose of family building.

The estimated total number of people worldwide using dating apps, which has become the most common way couples meet, is approximately 400 million, or about 5% of the world’s population. On an average day, over 25 million people are actively using dating apps, which includes casual browsing and engaging in online conversations

In contrast, many people now view dating as a means to discover themselves and experience personal growth, rather than solely as a path to marriage and starting a family. These individuals prioritize personal development, career advancement, and diverse experiences before thinking about settling down. With casual dating becoming more common and accepted, there is also a greater focus on authenticity and forming connections with others, including potential partners.

Dating apps, websites, and mobile phones, combined with the growing use of generative artificial intelligence, chatbots, and virtual reality, have contributed to the rapid rise of online dating. It has become an increasingly mainstream and popular way to meet someone and potentially find a significant other. These modern technologies offer unprecedented access to a diverse array of people, breaking down geographical and social barriers.

These developments have made dating and courtship both easier and more complicated. In particular, modern technologies are contributing to new dating norms, behaviors, expectations, benefits and frustrations.

Among the growing numbers of dating app users are those desiring a romantic relationship and others seeking a long-term companion or marital partner. In contrast, many individuals simply want to date casually or “hook up” with someone, meaning they have informal encounters without emotional ties but leading to sexual involvement.

Many men and women often struggle to form genuine connections with others when their interactions are confined to online messaging. The abundance and convenience of available dating options can also make it difficult to commit to one individual, leading to a cycle of constantly searching for the next best person to date.

Social media platforms encourage users to showcase or highlight the best parts of their lives. These enhanced presentations often create unrealistic expectations and disappointments in dating.

The estimated total number of people worldwide using dating apps, which has become the most common way couples meet, is approximately 400 million, or about 5% of the world’s population. On an average day, over 25 million people are actively using dating apps, which includes casual browsing and engaging in online conversations

The dating app market reportedly made more than $6 billion in revenue in 2024. North America remains the largest dating app market, contributing 50% of global revenue in 2024, followed by Europe at 23%, with adoption levels climbing in the Asia-Pacific and Africa regions. Financial projections for the dating app market show that its global revenue could reach nearly $9 billion by 2030.

Globally, the total number of dating app platforms is estimated to be in the thousands. The global market is diverse, with various dating apps attracting and catering to different interests ranging from serious long-term relationships to casual hookups.

Among the most popular dating apps downloaded are Tinder, Badoo, Bumble, and Momo. In 2024, Tinder was reported to be the most downloaded dating app, with more than 6.1 million user downloads during the month of June. Other popular dating apps include eHarmony, Hinge, Match, OkCupid, and Plenty of Fish, each with its unique user base and focus (Table 1).

Source: Business of Apps and Statista.

The number of dating app users, their usage, and the social norms surrounding them vary considerably among countries due to cultural attitudes towards dating, relationships, and technology. Each country has its favorite or most popular dating app in terms of the number of downloads.

The numbers of men and women using dating apps also differ significantly across countries. In 2024, China had the largest number of dating app users, with nearly 83 million. The United States followed with approximately 61 million dating app users. India came in third place with about 27 million dating app users, followed by Brazil with 17 million dating app users (Figure 1).

Source: Statista Market Insights.

In 2024, the United States had the highest percentage of its population using dating apps, at around 18%. Following the US was France, with over 11% of its population using dating apps. South Korea came in third place among these selected countries, with nearly 11% of its population engaging in dating apps, followed by Germany at 9% (Figure 2).

Source: Statista Market Insights.

However, among single populations, the usage of dating apps is significantly higher. For instance, the proportions of single individuals using dating apps in North America, Europe and Asia are 45%, 30%, and 25%, respectively.

Guidelines, rules, and general behavior for dating through modern technologies vary based on gender, age, experience, and social norms. According to the most popular dating apps in 2024, approximately 62% of users are men.

The percentage of male users is notably higher in most countries and regions. For instance, in the United States and India, about 70% of dating app users are men, while in Europe, the percentage rises to 85%.

A disparity in what men and women seek while using dating apps complicates finding the right match. Because of this gender imbalance, men often express dissatisfaction with low match rates and lack of messages. In contrast, women frequently report feeling overwhelmed by too many choices, an abundance of messages, and disrespectful comments.

When it comes to motivation for using dating apps, men are more inclined towards casual encounters and easy communication, while women tend to prioritize safety and seek long-term relationships, aiming to avoid harassment.

Gender roles in dating have undergone significant changes. Shifting societal attitudes and the feminist movement have resulted in more egalitarian relationships. While these changes have led to more balanced relationships, they also require navigating new expectations and social dynamics.

In terms of the age of dating app users, the largest group, accounting for around 35%, consists of relatively young individuals, typically under the age of 25. These young users often have more time to explore various dating options before committing to a long-term relationship. Older users, aged 55 and above, represent a smaller but increasing percentage of users, typically around 10%.

Some dating apps estimate that approximately one third of relationships now begin through the use of a dating app. In the US, 10% of partnered adults met their spouse or partner on a dating site or app, with the proportion at 20% among those aged 18 to 29. In the UK, more than one-quarter of couples who married between 2017 and 2023 are said to have met online.

Moreover, there is a growing trend of partnered adults, particularly in Latin America and Western countries, choosing to cohabit without officially getting married.

Dating patterns today are significantly different from practices in the recent past, which relied mainly on face-to-face social encounters and family-centric processes. Dating in the modern era is a complex and multifaceted experience influenced by culture, technology, and norms.

Dating apps and websites accessed through cell phones have become a mainstream method for meeting new people. This new method has surpassed traditional avenues, such as meeting through friends or at social gatherings.

These modern technologies offer numerous opportunities for dating, developing relationships, finding partners, and even engaging in casual encounters. However, they have also presented challenges for both men and women, leading to the establishment of new dating norms, expectations, privacy concerns, benefits, and frustrations.

Joseph Chamie is a consulting demographer, a former director of the United Nations Population Division, and author of many publications on population issues.

Rajagopal P.V. at the International Civil Society Week (ICSW2025) in Bangkok. Credit: Zofeen Ebrahim/IPS

By Zofeen Ebrahim
BANGKOK, Nov 4 2025 (IPS)

“If nations can have defense ministries, why not peace ministries?” asks Rajagopal PV, the soft-spoken yet formidable founder of Ekta Parishad. “We are told to see issues through a gender lens—why not a peace lens? Why can’t we imagine a business model rooted in non-violence or an education system that teaches peace?”

Founded in 1989, Ekta Parishad—literally Forum for Unity—is a vast people’s movement of more than 250,000 landless poor, now recognized as one of India’s largest and most disciplined grassroots forces for justice.

To Rajagopal, these aren’t utopian dreams—they’re blueprints for a possible world.

Over the decades, Ekta Parishad has secured land rights for nearly half a million families, trained over 10,000 grassroots leaders, protected forests and water bodies, and helped shape key land reform laws and policies in India.

All this has been achieved not through anger, but through disciplined, nonviolent marches that stretch across hundreds of kilometers. Along the way, many leaders have walked beside him—among them, the current Prime Minister of Armenia.

In an age marked by deep disorder—where wealth concentrates in few hands, poverty spreads, and the planet itself trembles under human greed—the 77-year-old Gandhian remains unshaken in his belief that peace alone can redeem humanity.

“We must rescue peace from the clutches of poverty and all its evils,” he told IPS on the sidelines of the International Civil Society Week, standing on the football ground of Bangkok’s Thammasat University.

“And it can be done,” he insists—and his life is proof. In 1969, the centenary year of Mahatma Gandhi’s birth, the Government of India launched a unique exhibition on wheels, a ten-coach train carrying Gandhi’s life and message across the nation. Rajagopal was part of the team that curated and travelled with it.

“For an entire year, we journeyed from state to state. Thousands of schoolchildren would gather at railway platforms, their faces lit with curiosity, waiting to meet Gandhi through our displays,” he recalls.

Yet somewhere along those long railway tracks, Rajagopal began to feel that displaying Gandhi’s ideals wasn’t enough. “The exhibition was beautiful,” he says, “but what was the use of preaching non-violence if we couldn’t live it, breathe it, and bring it to life?”

That realization led him to one of the most daring experiments in peacebuilding India had ever seen—negotiating with the feared bandits of the Chambal valley. “It was 1970,” he recalls. “We moved cautiously, first meeting villagers on the periphery to build trust. Once we had their confidence, we sent word to the dacoits: we wanted to talk. With the government’s consent, we ventured into what we called a ‘peace zone’—often by night, walking for hours through deep ravines—to meet men the world only knew as outlaws.”

The dialogues continued for four years. Eventually, as many as 570 bandits laid down their arms before a photograph of Mahatma Gandhi—a sight India had never seen before. The government, in turn, promised they would not face the death penalty and would receive land and livestock to rebuild their lives. Rehabilitation took another four painstaking years, but it was a victory of conscience over fear.

“They didn’t just surrender their weapons—they surrendered their anger,” Rajagopal says quietly. “There was real repentance, and that takes time—but it lasts.” His commitment came at a cost. At his ashram—a spiritual retreat he had founded—he was threatened, beaten, and ordered to abandon his peace efforts. He talked them through to accepting his presence.

“Today that same region is heaven,” he smiles, his eyes crinkling with memory. “Fifty years ago, people trembled at sunset—terrified of the bandits. Today, you can travel at 2:00 pm in the night, where fear ruled once.”

The mass surrender may have looked like a triumph for the state, but Rajagopal urges people to look deeper. “It’s the invisible violence—poverty, injustice, and oppression—that breeds the visible one: dacoities, kidnappings, and killings,” he explains.

Though Rajagopal and his companions had ended one form of violence, the deeper, quieter kind—born of poverty and neglect—still festered. Until that was confronted, he knew, peace would remain incomplete.

Years of working alongside the poor had taught him one truth: non-violence needs structure. If India’s Indigenous and landless communities were to be heard, they had to be organized.

“We began training young people from dozens of villages,” he says. “They went door to door, teaching others not only about their rights—especially the right to land—but also how to claim them peacefully.”

With that foundation, a five-year plan took shape. Each village home chose one member to take part. Every day, the family set aside one rupee and a fistful of rice—a humble but powerful act of commitment.

They even created a “playbook” of possible scenarios—how to stay calm under provocation, how to respond to setbacks, and how to practice non-violence in thought and action. “In one of our marches, a truck ran over three of our people, killing them,” he recalls softly. “There was grief, but no retaliation. Instead, they sat in silence and meditated. That was our true test.”

In 2006, 500 marchers walked 350 kilometers from Gwalior to Delhi, demanding land rights. Nothing changed. But they didn’t stop.

A year later, in 2007, 25,000 people—many barefoot—set out again on the national highway. “Imagine that sight,” Rajagopal says, eyes gleaming. “Twenty-five thousand people walking for a month, powered only by hope.”

The march displayed not just India’s poverty but also its power—the quiet power of the poor united. It was among the most disciplined mobilizations the country had ever seen. “There was one leader for every hundred people,” Rajagopal explains. “We walked by day and slept on the highway by night. Those in charge of cooking went ahead each morning so that by sundown, a single meal was ready for all.”

In a later march, Rajagopal recalls, the government sent a large police force. “I was worried,” he admits. “I called the authorities to tell them this was a non-violent protest—we didn’t need protection. The officer replied, ‘They’re not there for you; they’re here to learn how disciplined movements should be.’”

Along the route, villages greeted them like family—offering bags of rice, water, and prayers. “There was never a shortage of food,” Rajagopal smiles. “When your cause is just, the world feeds you.”

By the time the march reached Delhi, the government announced a new land reform policy and housing rights and agreed to enact the Forest Rights Act.

The government dispersed the marchers with hollow promises and the reforms never happened.

So Ekta Parishad planned an even larger march—a Jan Satyagraha of 100,000 people in 2012.

“Halfway through, the government came running.”

Rajagopal’s face lights up as he recalls the event. “They agreed to our ten-point agenda and signed it in front of the people. That moment was historic—governments almost never do that; the Indian government certainly never does it!”

The agreement included land and housing rights, a national task force on land reform, the prime minister’s oversight of policy implementation, and fast-track courts to resolve land disputes.

Today, because of these long, barefoot marches, more than three million Indigenous people in India now have legal rights to land and housing. The struggle also gave birth to India’s Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation, and Resettlement Act—a landmark in people’s movements.

“The Act also safeguards fertile land,” Rajagopal explains. “Before the government can acquire any area, a social impact study must be done. And if farmland is taken, the owners receive four times its value in compensation.”

“The purpose of our marches,” Rajagopal says, “is not to fight the government, but to win it over. The government is not the enemy; injustice is. We must stand on the same side of the problem.”

For Rajagopal, peace is not a sentiment but a system—something that must be built, brick by brick, through dialogue and respect. “Non-violence,” he says, “isn’t passive. It’s active patience—listening, accepting differences, never policing thought.” The same principle, he believes, can heal families, neighborhoods, nations—and the world itself.

His next mission is to create a Youth Peace Force, ready to enter conflict zones and resolve disputes through dialogue. He has also launched the Peace Builders Forum, or Peace7, uniting seven countries—South Africa, Japan, Costa Rica, Switzerland, Canada, India, and Armenia. His dream is to expand it to Peace20, where, as he smiles, “wealth will never be a criterion for membership.”

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Sally Ncube, Equality Now, addresses the Standing Committee of the SADC Parliamentary Forum (SADC PF). Credit: Equality Now

By Cecilia Russell
JOHANNESBURG, Nov 3 2025 (IPS)

Closing the chapter on child marriages is still a distant ambition in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region, and despite great strides at developing and passing legislation to eradicate it, existing and emerging drivers are still at play, making youngsters vulnerable to the practice.

These were key messages from Equality Now at the Standing Committee Session of the SADC Parliamentary Forum (SADC-PF) held in Kempton Park, South Africa, from October 24 to November 1, with the theme of Enhancing the Role of Parliamentarians in Advocating for the Signing, Ratification, Accession, Domestication, and Implementation of SADC Protocols.

Equality Now, in partnership with SADC-PF, launched two policy briefs—Protection measures for children already in marriage in Eastern and Southern Africa and Addressing emerging drivers of child marriages in Eastern and Southern Africa—for Parliamentarians’ consideration during a session aimed at sensitizing and increasing their knowledge on child marriage legislation and trends.

SADC countries adopted the Model Law on Eradicating Child Marriage and Protecting Children in Marriage in 2016; however, its domestication is uneven, children already in marriages need protection, and emergent drivers of child marriage need to be factored into the legal frameworks and policies.

Equality Now’s Divya Srinivasan addresses the Standing Committee of the SADC Parliamentary Forum (SADC PF). Credit: Equality Now

Equality Now’s Divya Srinivasan elaborated on the context of the domestication of the SADC model law on child marriage, noting that seven out of 16 countries (or about 45 percent) set the minimum age of 18 without exceptions. Five out of the 16 SADC countries set the age of 18 with some exceptions, with, for example, Botswana specifically excluding customary and religious marriages from the protection.

“Four countries, or around 25 percent, including Eswatini, Lesotho, South Africa, and Tanzania, provide for the minimum age of between 15 and 18. In these countries, the minimum age of marriage is different for boys and girls, with boys invariably having a higher age limit. In addition to these differences, all four countries allow for traditional and parental consent to lower the age of marriage,” Srinivasan noted.

Bevis Kapaso from Plan International said that since 2016, child marriage has dropped by 5 percentage points, going from 40 percent of all marriages to 35 percent in 2025, making it unlikely that the region will achieve SDG target 5.3, which aims to “eliminate all harmful practices, such as child marriage, early and forced marriage, and female genital mutilation” by 2030.

Most concerning was that the decrease was mainly urban, with the practice remaining fairly entrenched in rural areas.

This meant that children in marriages should be protected, and parliamentarians sensitized the drivers that were halting progress toward ending the practice.

Lawmakers should strive to ensure that married children have the right to void their marriages, retain their rights, access the property acquired during marriage, and not have their citizenship revoked, said Nkatha Murungi, an Equality Now Consultant.

“Children (in these circumstances) often end up stateless,” she said. While child marriage was a “symptom and a driver of entrenched inequality, poverty, and rights violations,” parliamentarians had a role to play in ensuring immediate, targeted measures to protect and empower children already in marriage, including the right to custody of their offspring and access to sexual and reproductive services.

Nkatha Murungi, an Equality Now Consultant, addresses the Standing Committee of the SADC Parliamentary Forum (SADC PF). Credit: Equality Now

Murungi suggested that lawmakers should also become aware of emerging issues, such as climate change. She said that after the 2019 floods in Malawi, which affected more than 868,900 people and displaced 86,980 individuals, child marriage spiked. Parliamentarians, according to Equality Now, should integrate child marriage prevention into national climate change adaptation and disaster risk management strategies.

It also suggested a gender-sensitive approach to economic empowerment by “supporting climate-resilient economic opportunities and programs for women and girls in affected communities.”

Other concerning emergent and persistent drivers include conflict and insecurity and increased migration and displacement, which often remove children from protective oversight while persistent poverty and inequality drive children into marriage.

The policy brief also warned about the rapid growth of technology, which, “while enabling advocacy and awareness, also facilitates misinformation that normalizes harmful practices, including child marriage.”

Sylvia Elizabeth Lucas, a South African parliamentarian and Vice President of the SADC parliamentary forum, on the sidelines of the meeting, stated that protecting children is non-negotiable; she emphasized that practical legislation and implementation, guided by the “spirit of ubuntu” (compassion and humanity), can effectively protect girl children.

On the sidelines of the meeting, Murungi elaborated that it was important to look at why the traditional approaches were not resulting in the ending of child marriages. Poverty has always been considered a driver, but traditional efforts to end child marriage have not benefited those living in poverty. Education was key to empowerment, not only for keeping children in school and out of marriage but also for giving them options for their futures.

The forum was reminded that it was imperative that the SADC Model Law be updated in their countries to reflect some of these emerging drivers.

“It is also necessary for Parliament and the Executive at the national level to work together to promote anti-child marriage policies and laws and ensure that targeted policy responses fill all prevailing gaps,” the policy brief on emergent drivers concluded.

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Parliamentarians from the Asian Population and Development Association (APDA) and the Forum of Arab Parliamentarians on Population and Development (FAPPD) met in Cairo. Credit: APDA

By Hisham Allam
CAIRO, Nov 3 2025 (IPS)

Inclusive legislation, empowered youth, and anti-violence policies are inseparable aspects of sustainable development and were the key messages at a conference of the Inter-Regional Meeting of Asian and Arab Parliamentarians on Population and Development held in Cairo on October 24, 2025.

The forum spotlighted urgent regional collaboration on sexual and reproductive health, youth inclusion, gender-based violence, and sustainable development. The gathering underlined the pressing need for legislative reform and multi-sector engagement to tackle complex social challenges amid shifting demographics and development imperatives.

The meeting, jointly organized by the Asian Population and Development Association (APDA) and the Forum of Arab Parliamentarians on Population and Development (FAPPD), with close collaboration from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), with the support of the Japan Trust Fund (JTF) and International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF), convened a high-profile roster of leaders and experts.

Key figures included Dr. Abdel Hadi al-Qasby, member of the Egyptian Senate and chair of the meeting; Dr. Mohamed Al-Samadi, Secretary General of the FAPPD; Professor Takemi Keizo, former Japanese Health Minister and Chair of APDA; and Dominic Allen, Deputy Regional Director for UNFPA Arab States Office.

Sessions homed in on strengthening sexual and reproductive health (SRH) as a cornerstone of social and economic progress, with UNFPA’s Dr. Hala Youssef highlighting SRH’s role in boosting productivity and well-being.

“Healthy individuals contribute to a more productive economy,” she said. The forum candidly addressed the region’s demographic challenges, barriers in access to care, and declining donor funding that threaten gains in maternal health and family planning.

Youth empowerment emerged as a strategic priority throughout the forum, with policymakers acknowledging that the region’s overwhelming majority under 30 must be engaged as active partners in shaping their future, rather than passive recipients of policy decisions.

Dr. Rida Shibli, former member of the Jordanian Senate, underscored this shift in mindset, stating, “Youth are partners, not just beneficiaries,” and advocating for structured, inclusive platforms that effectively empower young people to influence policy.

Tunisia’s progressive reforms—featuring the establishment of youth councils and vocational training programs—were highlighted as leading examples of meaningful youth engagement fostering both opportunity and participation.

The forum’s candid discussion on gender-based violence (GBV) underscored its pressing public health implications.

Mohamed Abou Nar, Chief Programs and Impact Officer at Pathfinder International, warned that despite the existence of comprehensive legal protections, enforcement remains inconsistent and inadequate.

He declared, “GBV is a public health emergency,” emphasizing the need to implement survivor-centered health services and legal reforms grounded in robust community involvement and multisectoral collaboration.

Hibo Ali Houssein, MP from Djibouti, reflected on the tension between progressive laws and enduring cultural norms that limit justice access for GBV survivors, while Bahrain’s Dr. Mohammed Ali called for legislative alignment to optimize private sector contributions, stating, “The private sector must provide capital, spark innovation, and create jobs within frameworks mandating sustainability.”

Country-specific achievements illustrated the forum’s depth. Cambodia is swiftly moving towards graduating from Least Developed Country status by 2027, with economic and regional partnerships propelling its long path to upper-middle-income status.

MP Chandara Khut stated plainly, “Peace has brought stability, which in turn nurtures development and growth.”

Sarah Elago, the representative from the Philippines, made a clear call on funding for adolescent pregnancy and maternal health, stating that “development is measured by dignity, equality, well-being, and everyday experiences of women, youth, and the people—not merely by numbers.”

The delegates called on parliamentarians, governments, and partners to convert dialogue into concrete action, emphasizing transparency, accountability, and regional solidarity as key drivers toward shared goals.

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Merlyn Sandoval next to the rainwater collection tank built on the small plot where she lives, in the village of San Jose Las Pilas, in eastern Guatemala. She and her family participate in a program to alleviate the effects of the drought in the Central American Dry Corridor. Credit: Edgardo Ayala / IPS

By Edgardo Ayala
SAN LUIS JILOTEPEQUE, Guatemala, Oct 30 2025 (IPS)

Water scarcity that relentlessly hits the rural communities in eastern Guatemala, located in the so-called Central American Dry Corridor, is a constant threat due to the challenges in producing food, year after year. But it is also an incentive to strive to overcome adversities.

The peasant families living in this region struggle to counter hopelessness and, with the help of international cooperation, manage to confront water scarcity. With great effort, they produce food, aware of the importance of caring for and protecting the area’s micro-watersheds."Unfortunately, last year the rainy season also ended in September and we harvested almost nothing, there was no rainy season, there was no water. So it's difficult for us here, that's why they call it the Dry Corridor, because we don't have water" –Ricardo Ramirez.

“We are in the Dry Corridor, and it’s hard to produce the plants here, even if you’ve tried to produce them, because due to the lack of water (the fruits) don’t reach their proper weight,” Merlyn Sandoval, head of one of the families benefiting from a project that seeks to provide the necessary tools and knowledge for people to overcome water insecurity and produce their own food, told IPS.

Sandoval is a native of the village of San Jose Las Pilas, in the municipality of San Luis Jilotepeque, in the department of Jalapa, in eastern Guatemala. Her community has been included in the program, funded by Sweden and implemented by several organizations, such as the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), together with the Guatemalan government.

The initiative, which began in 2022 and ends this December, reaches 7,000 families living around the micro-watersheds of seven municipalities in the departments of Chiquimula and Jalapa, in eastern Guatemala. These towns are Jocotan, Camotan, Olopa, San Juan Ermita, Chiquimula, San Luis Jilotepeque, and San Pedro Pinula.

The project focuses on creating the conditions to promote food and nutritional security and the resilience of the population, prioritizing water security that allows for food production.

“The strength of the (project’s) goals lies in the training and the action of the micro-watershed concept… people were trained depending on whether they were upstream, downstream, or in the middle of the watershed,” Rafael Zavala, FAO representative in Guatemala, told IPS.

He added: “The area is highly expulsive of labor due to migration, and this causes women to be the heads of households.”

The San Jose River basin is one of the watersheds being targeted for protection and preservation due to its importance for the water security of the towns in San Luis Jilotepeque, in eastern Guatemala. Credit: Edgardo Ayala / IPS

Drought and poverty

A report from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) indicates that the area included in the program shows a significant deterioration of livelihoods and a scarcity of economic opportunities.

It adds that in the department of Chiquimula, 70.6% of the population lives in poverty, while in Jalapa, the figure reaches 67.2%.

The Central American Dry Corridor, which is 1,600 kilometers long, covers 35% of Central America and is home to more than 10.5 million people.

In this belt, over 73% of the rural population lives in poverty and 7.1 million people suffer from severe food insecurity, according to FAO data.

Central America is a region of seven nations, with 50 million inhabitants, of which 18.5 million live in Guatemala, the most populous country, with high inequality and where a large part of poor families are indigenous.

In the home of Merlyn Sandoval’s family in San Jose Las Pilas, the granary for storing the corn and beans, which are so difficult to produce due to the lack of water in the area of eastern Guatemala, is never missing. Credit: Edgardo Ayala / IPS

Learning to Harvest Rainwater

As part of the project, the young Sandoval has learned the key points about micro-watershed management and has developed actions to harvest rainwater on her plot, in the backyard of her house. There, she has set up a circular tank, whose base is lined with an impermeable polyethylene geo-membrane, with a capacity of 16 cubic meters.

When it rains, water runs down from the roof and, through a PVC pipe, reaches the tank they call a “harvester,” which collects the resource to water the small garden and the fruit trees, and to provide water during the dry season, from November to May.

In the garden, Sandoval and her family of 10, harvest celery, cucumber, cilantro, chives, tomatoes, and green chili. In fruits, they harvest bananas, mangoes, and jocotes, among others.

Next to the rainwater harvester is the fish pond where 500 tilapia fingerlings are growing. The structure, also with a polyethylene geo-membrane at its base, is eight meters long, six meters wide, and one meter deep.

When the fish reach a weight of half a kilo, they can be sold in the community.

“The harvesters fill up with what is collected from the rains, and that helps to give a water change for the tilapia and also to give water to the fruit trees,” said Sandoval, 27.

The young woman also produces corn and beans, on another nearby plot, of approximately half a hectare. These plantings, more extensive than the garden and fruit trees in the backyard, cannot be covered by irrigation from the tank.

Ricardo Ramirez shows the inside of the macro-tunnel (a small greenhouse) where he has managed to harvest cucumbers, tomatoes, and green chilies, and where the plants of the new tomato planting can already be seen, on his small farm in eastern Guatemala. Credit: Edgardo Ayala / IPS

As a result, these crops, in this region of the Dry Corridor, are always vulnerable to climatic fluctuations: they can be ruined both by lack of rain and by excess rain during the same rainy season, from May to November.

Sandoval has already lost 50% of her harvest due to excess rain, she stated, with a hint of sadness.

This has also happened to Ricardo Ramirez, another resident of San Jose Las Pilas, who has experienced these fluctuations of lack and excess of water in his crop of corn and beans, staples in the Central American diet.

“Unfortunately, last year the rainy season also ended in September and we harvested almost nothing, there was no rainy season, there was no water. So it’s difficult for us here, that’s why they call it the Dry Corridor, because we don’t have water,” said Ramirez, 59, referring to his bean crop, planted on two plots totaling half a hectare, of which he has lost roughly half.

From the rainwater collection tank, Ricardo Ramirez manages to drip-irrigate the crops in the macro-tunnel, as this type of greenhouse is called. The system has allowed him to harvest produce despite water insecurity in eastern Guatemala. Credit: Edgardo Ayala / IPS

Green Hope

However, the support from the program driven with Swedish cooperation funds has been vital for Ramirez, not only to stay afloat economically as a farmer, but also to bet, with hope and enthusiasm, on the land where he was born.

Through this international initiative, Ramirez was also able to set up a rainwater collection tank with a capacity of 16 cubic meters, as well as an agricultural macro-tunnel: a kind of small greenhouse, with a modular structure covered by a mesh that protects the crops from pests and other bugs.

Inside the macro-tunnel, he planted cucumbers, tomatoes, and green chili, among others, and watered them by drip irrigation through a hose that carried water from the tank, just three meters away.

“From one row I got 950 cucumbers, and 450 pounds (204 kilos) of tomatoes, and the chili, it just keeps producing. But it was because there was water in the harvester and I just opened the little valve, gave it just half an hour, by drip, and the soil got wet,” Ramirez told IPS, while checking a bunch of bananas or guineos, as they are known in Central America.

All of that generated sufficient income for him to save 2,000 quetzales (about 160 dollars), with which he was able to install electricity on his plot and also buy an electric generator to pump water from a spring within the property, for when the collection tank runs out in about two months.

In this way, Ramirez will be able to maintain irrigation and production.

San José Las Pilas has a community water system, supplied by a spring located nearby. The tank is installed in the high area of the village so that water flows down by gravity, but the resource is rationed to just a few hours a day, given the scarcity.

Nicolas Gomez still has to walk two hours, like many others, to get water from a river when his collection tank runs out during the dry season in eastern Guatemala. Credit: Edgardo Ayala / IPS

Long Walks to Obtain Water

However, not everyone is as lucky as Ramirez, to have a water spring on their property and to irrigate gardens when the collection tank runs out.

When that happens, Nicolas Gomez has to walk almost two hours to reach the San Jose River, the closest one, and carry water from there, loading it on his shoulder in containers, to meet basic hygiene and cooking needs.

“So now, in the rainy season, we have water stored in this tank. But for the dry season we have nothing, we go to the river to fetch water, to a spring that is quite far, about a two-hour walk, that’s how hard it is for us to obtain it,” said Gomez, a 66-year-old farmer who has also suffered the climate onslaughts of drought and excess water on his corn crops.

Gomez lives in Los Magueyes, a rural settlement, also within San Luis Jilotepeque. Poverty here is more acute and visible than in San Jose Las Pilas. There is no community water system or electricity, and families have to light themselves with candles at night.

“Life here is hard,” stated Gomez, amidst the smoke produced by the wood-fired stove he was using to cook a meal when IPS visited on October 21.

Disasters touch everyone but are not felt equally. Women often take longer to rebuild their livelihoods after a crisis and may face additional barriers in accessing the resources to facilitate a quicker recovery. Credit:: UNDP Nigeria

By Raquel Lagunas and Ronald Jackson
NEW YORK, Oct 20 2025 (IPS)

Climate and environmental challenges are hitting harder and more often, reshaping people’s lives around the world. While disasters touch everyone, their impacts are not felt equally. The most marginalized, especially women and girls, are too often the first to suffer and the last to recover.

Social roles, discrimination and economic inequalities amplify the risks women face in times of crisis and undermine communities’ capacity to rebuild their livelihoods. Placing gender equality at the heart of disaster risk reduction (DDR) isn’t only a matter of fairness, but a key to a more resilient future for all.

UNDP is working with partners to translate this vision into action, by advancing equality and inclusion at every stage of disaster risk reduction, from preparedness to response and recovery. Drawing on our experience we see five powerful ways women’s leadership and meaningful participation can strengthen communities’ ability to withstand and recover from future shocks.

Women’s leadership strengthens resilience 

At UNDP, we actively open doors for women to shape decisions and policies at every level, from local committees to national platforms. We draw on their expertise and perspectives while amplifying the leadership and innovation they already bring to building resilience.

By investing in women’s ideas and supporting their initiatives, we help unlock solutions that ripple across communities, strengthening food security, sustaining livelihoods, and driving progress on every front.

In Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Feminist Coalition for Climate Justice, supported by UNDP, has improved working conditions for over 75,000 women, trained 1,500 women officials in energy and climate management, and opened new opportunities for women-led enterprises.

Meanwhile, in Chad, with support from France through the Global Women, Peace and Security initiative, women’s cooperatives have combined climate-smart agriculture, solar irrigation, and early warning systems to reduce flood risks and support recovery, showing how women-led approaches can strengthen risk reduction measures, preparedness, livelihoods and peacebuilding, even in fragile settings.

Unpaid care responsibilities grow during crises, as disasters disrupt schools, health systems and basic services, placing even greater pressure on women. Credit: UNDP Haiti

Resilience relies on care

Resilience depends on care, and women shoulder more than three-quarters of the world’s unpaid caregiving, supporting children, older adults, people with disabilities and entire communities. These responsibilities grow during crises, as disasters disrupt schools, health systems and basic services, placing even greater pressure on women.

Recognizing and prioritizing care in disaster management, through early warning systems, safe spaces, and continuity of essential services, helps protect lives and speeds up recovery for everyone.

UNDP supports countries to integrate care into disaster and climate strategies. In Honduras, Cuba, Belize and Guatemala, a geo-referenced care mapping tool helps to identify gaps in childcare, eldercare and disability-inclusive services. In Honduras, this analysis helped authorities identify ‘care deserts’ in flood- and landslide-prone areas, prioritize safe-space upgrades, and ensure that care continuity is factored into evacuation and rehabilitation plans.

In Ukraine, the ‘Mommy in the Shelter’ initiative transformed a basement into a child-friendly refuge activated during air raids, linking early warning with ongoing maternal and childcare support, even in acute conflicts.

Gender data means better planning and better response

Good planning starts with good data. Without information that is broken down by sex, age, and disability, disaster risk reduction policies can miss the unique needs and strengths of different parts of the community, especially for marginalized groups. High-quality gender disaggregated data helps ensure that strategies are targeted, effective and inclusive.

Last year, UNDP increased sex-disaggregated data and gender analysis in 20 countries affected by crisis. Cuba, Indonesia, Maldives, Myanmar, Samoa and Yemen developed early warning systems that strengthen women’s engagement and leadership.

In Ethiopia, disaster risk reduction measures helped women-headed households recover from landslides, while in Armenia, inclusive risk assessments led by women fed directly into local development and recovery plans.

With strong data, broken down by sex, age and disability, disaster risk reduction policies can address the specific needs of different parts of societies, including marginalized groups. Credit: UNDP Türkiye

Institutions equipped with gender capacities are better equipped for resilience

Resilient communities start with resilient institutions. When organizations, from national authorities managing risks, to local risk committees, embed gender considerations into their policy, planning and programming, good intentions turn to real progress, moving from rhetoric to routine.

Guatemala’s national disaster risk management authority set a new standard by earning UNDP’s Gender Equality Seal for Public Institutions. This means gender mandates, data and participation, including for Indigenous women, are woven into local risk management. Stronger institutions like these are better equipped to meet people’s needs and build lasting resilience.

Breaking down barriers, building resilience

Despite real progress, gaps remain. Gender equality is still too often sidelined across disaster, climate, humanitarian and development efforts. Let’s work together to make women’s leadership, care and inclusion central to every plan and policy.

Together, we can:

• Make women’s leadership non-negotiable in DRR decision making and financing. 
• Direct more capital to women’s resilience, including through risk financing, social protection, and support to women-led enterprises. 
• Centre care in preparedness and continuity plans so alerts translate into protection for caregivers, children, older persons and persons with disabilities.
• Strengthen national and local institutional capacities to apply a gender lens to how risks are managed, from efforts to prevent, prepare, respond to and recover from hazardous events. 
•  When these measures are consistently applied, communities everywhere will be better able to face challenges and confidently bounce back.

Raquel Lagunas is Global Director of Gender Equality, UNDP; Ronald Jackson is Head of the Disaster Risk Reduction, Recovery for Building Resilience, UNDP

Source: UN Development Programme (UNDP)

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Tsholofelo Msimango pictured at her home in Brakpan, near Johannesburg. Credit: TB Alliance/Jonathan Torgovnik

By Ed Holt
BRATISLAVA, Oct 20 2025 (IPS)

When Tsholofelo Msimango joined a small trial of a new drug regimen for tuberculosis (TB) treatment a decade ago, she had no idea whether the medicines she was about to be given would help her.

But having already spent six months in hospital after developing extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB), the most lethal form of the disease, which at the time was barely curable—three-quarters of people with XDR-TB were thought to die before they even received a diagnosis and only a third of those who got treatment survived—Msimango decided she had little to lose.

“I had my doubts, of course, as to whether it would have any success,” she tells IPS.  “But to be honest, at that point all I could think about was that it might make me better, that I might be able to get out of hospital and go home. I was ready to take that chance. I’m glad I did. That trial saved my life—I am sure of it,” she says.

Msimango, who was 21 at the time, from Brakpan in South Africa, was one of 109 participants in the Nix-TB trial of a new drug regimen that ran across three sites in the country between 2015 and 2017.

Until then, typical treatment for the most severe drug-resistant forms of TB would involve patients taking daily doses of a potent cocktail of pills—dozens in some cases—as well as injections for sometimes as long as two years.

The side effects of such regimens can be horrific—deafness, kidney failure and psychosis have been reported—and there are high rates of treatment drop-out, leading not only to a worsening of the patient’s own condition but also to the further spread of the worst strains of the disease among communities.

The Nix-TB trial tested an all-oral six-month drug regimen, which was a combination of the drugs pretomanid, bedaquiline and linezolid (BPaL).

Its results—the regimen had a 90 percent treatment success rate —werehailed as groundbreaking by experts, and the trial proved to be a landmark moment in the fight against the world’s most deadly infectious disease.

Msimango says that until she joined the trial, she had been taking “lots of pills and having injections.” The latter, she says, had stopped working against the disease.

But not long into the trial, she noticed a change. Before the trial she had struggled to keep weight on because of her illness and treatment.

“It was when I started to gain weight that I began to think that the treatment was working. We had check-ups, including for weight, every week and when I saw myself putting on weight, I knew then that I was getting better,” she says.

By the end of the trial, she says she felt like a different person.

Tests showed she was free of TB.

“Of course I was excited about the fact that I could finally stop taking medicines, and because I was then healthy and free of TB and could live a normal life again, but I was also excited about the fact that I was going to be able to finally leave hospital after a year and go home.

“I had already been in hospital for seven months before the trial started, and then another six months for the trial, and it was hard being away from home for a year. The hospital was a long way from where I lived so it was very hard for my mother to come and visit me and bring me things,” she says.

Tsholofelo Msimango and her son at her home in Brakpan, near
Johannesburg. Credit: TB Alliance/Jonathan Torgovnik

But while now healthy and free of TB, the disease has continued to play a large role in Msimango’s life.

She decided she wanted to help others affected by TB. Today she is a TB community advocate and educator and helps to recruit people for medical studies.

“I would recommend to anyone that if they get the chance to take part in a study like the one that I got to take part in, that they should go for it,” she says.

Now a mother to a young boy, she says she speaks to him about what she went through and about TB so that he understands about the disease and the risks it poses.

“I talk to my son about what happened to me, why I was in hospital and why I now work in the TB community. I tell my son and his friends about TB and what can be done to stop its spread and how they can help, for instance, by covering their mouths when they cough,” she says.

“Actually, I tell my story a lot because I hope it might help other people,” she adds.

Another participant in the trial, Bongiswa Mdaka, says the same.

“I talk to people all the time about TB and my experience with it—I’m very open about it. If I see someone has been coughing for more than two weeks, I tell them about the disease and about getting tested and treated as early as possible,” she told IPS.

Speaking from her home in Vereeniging, Gauteng, Mdaka, who was 27 when she started the trial, said that, like Msimango, it changed her life.

“The trial was a lifesaver for me. It not only changed my life but saved it. It gave me a second chance. Ten years ago, before the trial, the situation for people with XDR-TB was not good. I was diagnosed with MDR-TB and when my condition continued to get worse, I was hospitalized. I was in the hospital for three days and they told me that no, I don’t have MDR-TB; I have XDR-TB, the worst I could have. It was like hearing a death sentence.

Tsholofelo Msimango’s late mother, Zeldah Nkosi. She says her mother was a “pillar of support” during her time when she had TB. Credit: TB Alliance

“So when the people doing the trial came to me, it seemed like a godsend. I had no major expectations—I just hoped that I would get better. Today I am healthy and free of TB. I’m strong. I have a family and a normal life. Life is good,” she said.

Speaking to experts who were involved in the trial, it becomes clear that going into it, no one knew how important it would eventually prove to be in the future of TB treatment.

Dr. Pauline Howell managed the patients during the Nix-TB trial at the Sizwe Tropical Diseases Hospital in Johannesburg, where Msimango was a patient.

“Prior to the Nix trial we knew that treatment was too long, too toxic, worked in less than half of people afflicted with TB, and in those diagnosed with XDR TB (per the pre-2021 definition), only 20 percent were still alive after 5 years. I was still junior in clinical trials in 2015, but it was clear to everyone that knew anything about XDR-TB that replacing the extended treatment, which included at least 6 months of injectables, and all the other drugs (the kitchen sink approach) with just three drugs made us more than a little anxious,” she told IPS.

But like many of the trial’s participants, she saw relatively quickly how well the treatment was working.

“When trial participants started telling newly admitted patients about this trial and brought them to the research site before we had had a chance to speak with them, that was speaking loudly. When certain patients, who had been admitted for over two years, were suddenly starting to respond to TB treatment and culture convert, it was wonderful to celebrate with them, Howell, who is now Clinical Research Site Leader at Sizwe Tropical Disease Hospital, said. “When patients were relocating from the Eastern Cape to Gauteng just to get access to the trial, we knew this was the treatment we’d also want for ourselves and our loved ones.”

“There are definitely a few [trial participants] who may not have survived without this treatment, but for the majority, they were able to get back to their lives faster, potentially cause fewer onward infections and suffer less loneliness and other repercussions of having drug-resistant TB,” she added.

However, while the trial had an immediate effect on its participants, its results, which suggested the enormous potential of the regimen, paved the way for BPaL to revolutionize TB treatment.

“I had no idea that this trial would be the first step towards changing the treatment for drug-resistant tuberculosis worldwide,” Howell said.

“It’s good to remember that although TB is deadly, it is curable, and the side effects of the BPaL/M regimen are common but predictable and manageable. A decade ago, patients put an end to rental agreements for their homes, quit their jobs, told their partners to move on and their families took out funeral policies. These days, patients sit in front of me and say, ‘I have been here for two weeks already! I need to get home and back to my life’. It makes my head spin how much has changed, partially due to the Nix trial,” she added.

In 2022, the World Health Organization (WHO) endorsed BPaL with or without another drug, moxifloxacin (M), and BPaL(M) is today the preferred treatment option for drug-resistant TB.

According to data from the TB Alliance, the nonprofit group that developed pretomanid, BPaL and BPaL-based regimens, they treat about 75 percent of the overall number of drug-resistant TB cases treated annually. This number is projected to soon reach 90 percent.

Meanwhile, the group says, the regimens have already saved more than 11,000 lives and USD 100 million for health systems globally and by 2034 are expected to save an additional 192,000 lives and health systems almost USD 1.3 billion.

In some countries classed as having high-burden TB epidemics, they have already altered the TB landscape significantly.

“In South Africa, which adopted the BPaL/M guidelines in Sep 2023, we are seeing a single-digit percentage lost to follow-up for the first time in the history of our TB programme,” she says.

But the regimen’s potential may be in danger of not being fully fulfilled as richer nations cut foreign aid budgets, impacting funding that has traditionally helped support disease and other healthcare programmes in poor countries.

“The eternal challenge with TB is how closely it is tied to lack of access, poverty, substance use, being undomiciled and general lack of funding to overcome these challenges… Unfortunately, as long as there is poverty and lack of access, political will and funding, TB will continue to live side by side with us,” said Howell.

“Some people now can’t get their medications because of these cuts,” said Msimango. “They’re costing people’s lives.”

Note: This article is brought to you by IPS Noram in collaboration with INPS Japan and Soka Gakkai International in consultative status with ECOSOC.

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Excerpt:

A female merchant was crossing a bustling street in Hanoi, Vietnam. Despite economic development over five decades, development gaps in Asia and the Pacific remained. Credit: Unsplash/Jeremy Stewardson

By Sudip Ranjan Basu
BANGKOK Thailand, Oct 17 2025 (IPS)

The Asia-Pacific region has long served as a springboard for transforming socio-economic implementation gaps into development opportunities. With the 2030 deadline for the Sustainable Development Goals fast approaching, policymakers are stepping up efforts to translate policy announcements into tangible impacts.

Looking back since 1970s, the region’s development trajectory has been shaped by a series of crises that triggered transformative policy responses. By engaging strategic partnerships, countries in the region are well-positioned to promote shared prosperity for both people and the planet.

Anchoring crisis-driven policy shifts
In the 1970s, technological advances—particularly in agriculture—ushered in a new era. The introduction of high-yield crop varieties, known as the Green Revolution, boosted food production and rural incomes, laying the foundation for the emergence of a middle class. However, the decade also exposed vulnerabilities, as volatility in global commodity and energy prices exposed the risks of external shocks.

The 1980s brought further challenges. Rising oil prices and global interest rates strained national budgets across developing countries. The cost of servicing external debt crowded out investments in productive sectors, highlighting the risks of over-reliance on foreign aid.

The 1997 Asian financial crisis marked a watershed moment. Currency collapses, triggered capital flight and trade disruptions, leaving deep scars and prompting shifts in political governance and economic policy across the region.

By the early 2000s, optimism returned. Trade and investment surged, regional value chains expanded, and ICT-driven growth integrated economies more deeply into the global economy. Globalization was widely seen as a pathway to long-term prosperity.

Yet the 2008 global financial crisis shattered this euphoria. Inflation soared, investor confidence plummeted, and trade contracted.

Fast forward to the COVID-19 pandemic, which once again exposed lingering vulnerabilities: socio-economic inequality was deepened, jobs prospects dimmed, overdependence on supply chain became more pronounced, technological monopolies were revealed, and environmental fragility was clearly manifested. The pandemic reinforced the urgent need for adaptive policy frameworks.

These crisis episodes underscored the importance of coordinated policy action in an interconnected landscape, reinforcing the lesson that growth without adequate and shared outcomes is unsustainable.

Adjusting to changing socio-economic realities
The development journey has been marked by complexity and diversity. A comparative analysis over recent decades reveals recurring patterns: energy and food price volatility and tightening financial conditions have consistently tested policymakers. Rising interest rates in advanced economies have reignited debt concerns in developing countries, threatening economic stability and undermining progress.

Simultaneously, intensifying geopolitical competition is reshaping trade relationships, investment flows and technology transfers. Policymakers must navigate these shifts while advancing national development priorities and adapting to evolving dynamics.

These pressures have prompted to diversify its sources of economic growth and strategic engagements. Despite impressive achievements in social development, long-term stability and impact-driven outcomes hinge on governments’ ability to manage external shocks, anticipate risks, and promote cross-border economic cooperation and accelerate climate action.

Recent policy shifts signal a move toward structural transformation. Governments are spearheading industrialization, accelerating green energy transitions and pioneering sustainable financing mechanisms. This marks a shift from short-term crisis management to building medium- and long-term socio-economic progress.

The pandemic years further emphasised the need for adaptive policies—ones that can absorb unexpected shocks while maintaining progress toward stability.

Adapting through policy lessons
The development experience, particularly the least developed countries, the landlocked developing countries and small island developing States, offers valuable insights into building institutional capabilities and preventing future crises. Four strategic policy insights emerge:

Price stability matters: Volatile prices have repeatedly undermined development gains. Strategic foresight and balanced economic policy planning are essential to safeguard progress.
Fiscal buoyancy is critical: Excessive external borrowing has triggered past crises.

Creating fiscal space, mobilizing domestic resources, scaling blended finance and implementing coordinated debt management frameworks are vital for development.

Crisis preparedness requires coordination: The 1997 and 2008 crises showed that no country can respond effectively in isolation. Strengthening institutions is crucial for early warning systems, policy dialogue and coordinated action.

Sustainability is key to people-centred development: Climate change, socio-economic disparities and institutional inefficiencies pose long-term risks. Integrating sustainability into strategies and promoting technological transformation are no longer optional; they are imperative.

Turning points
The Asia-Pacific region’s development story is one of transition, and transformation. Connecting these turning points reveals a region that has consistently learned from its challenges and leveraged them to advance policy solutions.

The path ahead is promising, but policies must adapt to address shifting socio-economic dynamics, structural and climate change vulnerabilities, and emerging geopolitical realignments. These efforts must be anchored in regional cooperation, inclusive dialogue, and coordinated action, particularly through platforms such as ESCAP.

While governments play a central role, long-term progress will depend on the collective engagement of the private sector, academia, civil society and regional institutions. With strategic convergence, the Asia-Pacific region is well-positioned to overcome today’s uncertainty and shape a better future for all.

Sudip Ranjan Basu is Secretary of the Commission, ESCAP

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Kamikawa Yoko, Chair of JPFP and of AFPPD addresses the Asian Parliamentarians’ Conference on Education for Life, Safety, and Human Dignity. Credit: APDA

By Cecilia Russell
TOKYO & JOHANNESBURG, Oct 13 2025 (IPS)

Vulnerable children are being targeted online faster than parliamentarians and law enforcers can act, a conference convened by the Asian Population and Development Association (APDA) heard. Yet, with international cooperation and sharing of ideas, lawmakers believe the scourge of online abuse can be addressed.

The Asian Parliamentarians’ Conference on Education for Life, Safety, and Human Dignity in Tokyo, Japan, on 7 October 2025 brought parliamentarians from Asian countries, ministry officials, practitioners, partner organizations, experts and media together to find solutions for the elimination of sexual crimes and violence against children and youth. It ended with a clear call for deeper international collaboration to tackle the protection of children in the digital age.

In her keynote address, Kamikawa Yoko, Chair of JPFP and of AFPPD, said, “Traditionally, in Japan, sexuality education was considered taboo; even the word ‘sexuality’ made discussion untouchable,” so she had proposed the concept of ‘Life Safety Education (LSE)’ so that it could be more readily accepted.

Lawmakers and other delegates at the Asian Parliamentarians’ Conference on Education for Life, Safety, and Human Dignity. Credit: APDA

Setting the scene for the discussion, she said young people come to major cities like Tokyo and Osaka and are exposed to a vast amount of information through the internet and social media—with some lured by promises of an “easy income” only to be deceived and become victims before “they realize it, they may be coerced into the sex industry, human trafficking, drug trafficking, or other criminal activities.”

LSE was more than just teaching children age-appropriate knowledge about the bodies; it empowers children to recognize their rights, develop self-determination and protect themselves, she said, emphasizing that the lawmakers are often approached by public institutions and civil society groups for support.

“Protecting children is not optional. It is our shared responsibility,” she reminded the lawmakers.

Nakazono Kazutaka from Japan’s Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology elaborated on the country’s Life Safety Education program, saying it aims to prevent children from becoming perpetrators, victims, or bystanders, using age-appropriate content and social media guidance. The education is integrated into health and PE classes, with digital materials and teacher training. The initiative is expanding to more schools and regions, emphasizing human rights and dignity.

Makishima Karen, MP Japan, addresses the Asian Parliamentarians’ Conference on Education for Life, Safety, and Human Dignity. Credit: APDA

Makishima Karen, MP Japan, said the levels of incidences were worryingly high, with 2,783 cases related to child pornography involving 1,024 individuals reported. She also explained that many victims fell outside of the law enforcement and safety nets designed to assist them. Often the grooming starts innocently, with young people detailing hobbies and daily life; they often become entrapped by people who groom them, lure them in with promises, and then sexually assault and abuse them.

The worrying factor is that the abuse remains unreported or if reported, the children disappear, making follow-ups difficult. New laws criminalizing unauthorized filming have been passed, Makishima said but legal mandates need to be extended. She cited an example of how victims of non-consensual sexual images must request removal individually from each digital platform, irrespective of their age—unlike in the US, where the visuals need removal within 48 hours.

Chanlinda Mith, Director of Research of the General Department of Legislation and Research, National Assembly of the Kingdom of Cambodia, addresses the Asian Parliamentarians’ Conference on Education for Life, Safety, and Human Dignity. Credit: APDA

Makishima outlined measures the Ministry of Education was involved in, including the LSE, which emphasized the importance of “not becoming a bystander when witnessing harmful behaviors.”

“Children need to understand the impact of sexual violence and foster a mindset that respects oneself and others too,” she said, and this is done with different messaging for various ages, so, for example, early childhood education would include messages that “your body belongs to you, and parts covered by a swimsuit are private and should not be shown or touched.”

Teens and youth messaging is unambiguous, stating that any “sexual act that you do not want constitutes sexual violence,” and the perpetrator and not the child is blamed.

Yet there is a need for content ratings in online communication that are effective and enforceable, but the problem is international rather than national—and she called for a deeper collaboration.

“Platform operators are very often global; therefore, this would require international collaboration. On the ground, the teachers are trying to educate children, but we need international collaborations beyond the boundaries of countries.”

Among other solutions mooted by international delegates at the conference was the restriction on the use of social media for children and youth under 16.

Catherine Wedd, an MP from New Zealand, gave a remote presentation to the Asian Parliamentarians’ Conference on Education for Life, Safety, and Human Dignity. Credit: APDA

“Globally, the data is grim; 16 to 58 percent of girls in 30 countries have experienced cyber violence. These are our daughters, sisters and friends. The psychological toll is real. Cyberbullying destroys self-esteem and sparks anxiety and depression,” Catherine Wedd, an MP from New Zealand, said.

New Zealand, following the example of Australia, is moving to regulate social media for youth.

Wedd said she championed a bill that will “ensure that the onus is placed on the companies to create necessary age verification measures to prevent children from accessing social media platforms and to enforce a social media ban for users under 16.”

In Cambodia, social media in the form of a Youth Health mobile app has been developed to enhance health education and sexual and reproductive health for adolescents, Chanlinda Mith, Director of Research of the General Department of Legislation and Research, National Assembly of the Kingdom of Cambodia, told the conference.

Apart from crucial information designed to keep young people safe, the app, developed in collaboration with UNFPA, gives the youth anonymity should they need to discuss sensitive matters.

Both Yos Phanita, an MP from Cambodia and Dr. Abe Toshiko, Chair of the JPFP Project Team and MP Japan, reiterated the call for regional and international cooperation in their closing remarks

“We must continue to foster regional cooperations share best practice and advocate for comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) as a fundamental human right and a critical foundation for building healthy, equitable, sustainable societies across Asia,” said Phanita.

Abe agreed, saying that he hoped the discussion would serve as a “catalyst for concrete policy progress and for building greater understanding and support across our society.”

Note: The conference was organized by the Asian Population and Development Association (APDA) and Plan International Japan, in cooperation with the Japan Parliamentarians Federation for Population (JPFP) Project Team on LSE and the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF).
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Participants at the Non-Governmental Organizations Forum meeting held in Huairou, China, as part of the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women held in Beijing, China, on 4-15 september 1995. Credit: UN Photo/Milton Grant

By Naureen Hossain
UNITED NATIONS, Sep 30 2025 (IPS)

Thirty years since the UN Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, the resolve that defined and united the world toward a global agenda for gender equality make it just as relevant in 2025.

The Beijing Conference represents a turning point for the global movement in gender equality. It is marked by the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, which is still held up as a landmark document in presenting a comprehensive blueprint to achieve gender equality.

The Beijing Conference was just “one stop in a long and continuing journey of feminist advocacy,” said Sia Nowrojee, a Kenyan women’s rights advocate with more than thirty years’ experience.

“Even though it’s thirty years later, it’s absolutely relevant. It was the culmination of twenty years of advocacy and gender equality.” Nowrojee is the UN Foundation’s Associate Vice President of their Girls and Women Strategy division.

The Beijing Conference was the first time that the international community integrated gender equality into the global development and rights agenda. It was recognition that securing the rights and dignities for all women and girls would be integral to achieving widespread development. This was key for the countries that had emerged in the post-colonial era.

Sia Nowrojee, UN Foundation’s Associate Vice President of Girls and Women Strategy. Credit: UN Foundation

The leadership of advocates from the Global South was instrumental to the Beijing PoA. Representatives from Africa, Asia, and Latin America pushed for the measures that make the framework as inclusive as it is. Nowrojee gave the example of girls’ rights being recognized thanks to the efforts of African feminists in the lead-up to Beijing.

Hibaaq Osman, a Somali human rights activist and founder of El-Karama, considers that the Global South activists had been uniquely prepared to participate as they had lived through their countries’ great political upheavals against colonialism and racism.

Osman attended Beijing 1995 as part of the Center of Strategic Initiatives of Women, a civil society network.

Hibaaq Osman, a Somali human rights activist and founder of El-Karama. Credit: UN Foundation

“For me, as a young woman, I was shocked by the things that I heard. I was raised to believe that everything was a privacy. But to hear a woman speaking for herself and sharing things that I never thought you could share with others, including violence against women… It absolutely opened my eyes and made me see, ‘Oh my god, I can actually share things with other women,’” Osman told IPS.

For Osman, the Beijing conference represented the possibilities of what could be achieved through a shared agenda and a shared sense of hope. The unique energy from that conference drove her advocacy work through groups like the Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa (SIHA) and then El-Karama, which is working to end violence against women in the Arab region and South Sudan.

General view of the opening session of the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing. Credit: UN Photo/Milton Grant

Beijing 1995 also provided the expectation of accountability from governments and policy makers if they did not implement the PoA. “That had never happened before. There was a mechanism for the first time…,” said Osman. “You can hold governments and policymakers accountable. But you also have the connection with grassroots. That it was no longer the individual woman that could claim that she was the leader, but having accountability to your own people, I think that whole thing was fantastic.”

“I think the legacy of Beijing 1995 honestly, it gave us a legacy of getting out of our corners and just wide open to the rest of the women. And I think that vision, that framework is still working.”

Delegates working late into the night to draft the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. Credit: UNDP/Milton Grant

The success of the Women’s Conferences also demonstrated the UN’s role as a space to build up the gender equality movement, Nowrojee remarked. The UN has also served as a platform for emerging countries to raise their issues to the international community and to shape global agendas on their terms.

Prior to Beijing, the UN World Conference on Women had previously been held in Nairobi (1985), Copenhagen (1980) and Mexico City (1975). These were also key forums for people from all parts of the world to build relationships and for there to be a “cross-pollination of ideas and experiences”, laying down the groundwork for what was later achieved in Beijing.

Nowrojee was 18 years old when she attended the Nairobi 1985 Conference as part of a school/youth delegation. The experience was formative in listening to women’s activists from the region impart their wisdom and insights.

“To see the world’s women come to my home and talk about the fact that we mattered was life-changing for me,” Nowrojee said. “I made friends who I still work with and love and see today. And I think there is that sort of personal part, which is both personally sustaining, but it’s a critical part of feminist movement building.”

Each conference built up momentum that saw no sign of slowing down. Osman and Nowrojee explained that as gains were being made at local, national and global levels, this encouraged those in the movement to act with urgency and go further. This provided them the spaces to learn how to refine the messages for local contexts.

Delegates at the Fourth UN World Conference on Women in Beijing 1995. Credit: UNDPI /UN Women

The gains towards gender equality should be noted: the codification of women’s rights around the world, their increased participation in politics and in peace negotiations. Evidence has shown that investing in women’s participation in society through health, education and employment leads to economic growth and prosperity. More women in the workforce mean greater economic gains and stability. Increased social protections for women lead to more stability in communities.

And yet, there was backlash to the momentum. Recent years have seen the rise of anti-rights and anti-gender movements gain greater traction, combined with increasing attempts to strip women of their rights. UN Women has warned that one in four countries are reporting a backlash to women’s rights.

Nowrojee remarked that the autocratic leaders that champion these movements target women’s rights because it threatens their own agenda. “If you are silencing half the human family, and you are hampering their ability to make decisions about their bodies, to participate in political process… these are very, very effective ways of undermining democracy, development, peace and the achievement of all the goals and values that we hold dear.”

“They understand that if you bring women down, you are bringing society down, because women are the core of society,” Osman added.

The modern movements are also well-funded and well-organized. But there is an irony to it in that they use the same tactics that feminist movements have been using for decades by organizing at the grassroots level before moving their influence up to the national level and beyond. But this should not be where activists fall to despair. Instead they should understand, Osman and Nowrojee remarked, that women in this space already know what actions need to be taken to regain lost momentum.

“I’m sure that Sia and I and many, many others who were part of that are also thinking about today and what’s happening, and we know the space for civil society is shrinking,” Osman said. “The space for democracy, human rights, justice, reproductive rights, for all of that, there is absolutely a rollback, But it’s not going to delay us. We are just going to be more sophisticated and ask ourselves “Where are the blocks, how do we build… diverse constituencies?”… So it is hard, but we are not slowing down whatsoever.”

Today, it may seem the pursuit of gender equality is an ongoing struggle that faces the threat of autocratic movements that sow distrust and division. For the people who championed the women’s rights movement and can recall a time before the Beijing PoA, they are all too aware of what is at stake. The leaders in modern movements today need to look back to the past to take lessons, and to take courage.

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The panelists of the high-level side event, African-led Innovation: Shaping Sustainable Futures With or Without Aid, for the 80th session of the United Nations General Assembly. Credit: Oritro Karim.

By Oritro Karim
UNITED NATIONS, Sep 26 2025 (IPS)

On September 24, African-led organizations convened a high-level side event during the 80th session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA80) The event – African-led Innovation: Shaping Sustainable Futures With or Without Aid – was organized in partnership with eHealth Africa, Population Services International (PSI), Population Council, and Reach Digital Health. The dialogue amplified voices from African-led organizations and highlighted the importance of homegrown innovations for sustainability—regardless of the availability of foreign aid—amid shrinking donor funding and widening global inequalities.

2025 has been a particularly turbulent year for global development, with cuts to United States foreign aid stifling global development for numerous nations and hindering governments’ abilities to support basic services—such as healthcare, education, protection, and nutritional support. Despite these setbacks, Africa has demonstrated remarkable self-reliance, as governments, stakeholders, and private sectors have come together to drive innovations that prioritize sustainability and inclusion.

“We as Africans have always innovated, as part of who we are and the inequities that we have overcome,” said Chernor A. Bah, Minister of Information and Civic Education for Sierra Leone, a global advocate for youth empowerment and the moderator of the panel, in his opening remarks. “Today, there is a unique opportunity to establish self-reliance. We are the youngest continent on Earth and are full of incredible potential. We can build a society that is economically strong and socially just.”

During the dialogue, the panelists agreed that Africa possesses all the necessary tools to build a sustainable and equitable future, even in the absence of foreign aid. However they emphasized that this vision can only be realized if systems for innovation are designed to be as inclusive as possible, beginning with a community-centered approach.

Debbie Rogers, CEO of Reach Public Health, noted that the primary goal of public health systems should be scalability—designed around the “lowest common denominator” or built to address issues that affect the vast majority of people.

Michael Holscher, President of PSI also emphasized the importance of incorporating the perspectives and insights of those most directly affected by changes in public health systems. “Innovation works best when it’s designed close to the populations, people, and communities it’s meant to serve, co-designed with insights and community engagement in what those solutions are and solutions that will work long term,” said Holscher.

Additionally, the panelists stressed that the voices of marginalized or vulnerable communities must be at the forefront of discussions surrounding sustainable development. Specifically, these approaches must amplify the voices of women and girls, who have historically been overlooked, despite serving as the backbone of African economies. According to the World Economic Forum, women and girls make up roughly 58 percent of the continent’s self-employed population and 13 percent of its gross domestic product. However, they are disproportionately impacted by gender-based violence, with one in four experiencing a violent encounter before the age of 18.

“It’s very important to recognize that we must be mindful not to replicate the same inequities that we are trying to dismantle with this new innovation,” said Dr. Kemi DaSilva-Ibru, the founder of Women at Risk International Foundation (WARIF), a non-profit organization that works to eradicate and advocate against sexual and gender-based violence of women and girls across Africa. “We must look at innovation through the lens of inclusion, it has to be embedded in the design of these innovations. It is also important to recognize accessibility, in terms of tailoring innovation to suit marginalized people. We need to recognize differences, we need to look at innovation through the ecosystem of all different players, he or she is going to determine whether that program is sustainable.”

Additionally, the panelists agreed that directing financial resources to the appropriate stakeholders and maintaining effective, consistent communication between communities, governments, and the private sector are critical steps in fostering sustainable development and driving progress in Africa.

“Breakthroughs happen when there’s good collaboration, across public and private sectors, civil societies, and those who have expertise in technology, delivery, and policy,” said Holscher. “PSI is committed to the idea that African-led innovation will create an unstoppable momentum towards resilient health systems and sovereignties.”

Fara Ndiaye, Deputy Executive Director of Speak Up Africa—a Senegal-based advocacy and communications organization dedicated to empowering African leaders, driving policy change, and promoting sustainable development—stressed that accountability must remain central. She highlighted the importance of financing the right stakeholders, amplifying the right voices, providing scientists with platforms to share their findings, and rallying stakeholders around a shared agenda.

“Accountability in this new era cannot be a one way street where governments report upward and communities audit,” Ndiaye said. “What we are really trying to push for is making sure there is structured engagement between governments and private sector companies…We have the opportunity to redistribute the cards, decide who gets to control the resources and who gets to control what success looks like.”

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Bhuwan Ribhu, founder of Just Rights for Children. Credit: Just Rights for Children

By Naureen Hossain
UNITED NATIONS, Sep 26 2025 (IPS)

Global leaders came together at the sidelines of this year’s UN General Assembly to commit to ending child marriage, calling on all world leaders to make concerted efforts to ensure accountability and enforce the laws that prohibit it.

Just Rights for Children is committed to the eradication of child-related abuses, including child trafficking, online abuse and child marriage. This NGO, first founded in India by lawyer and activist Bhuwan Ribhu, has worked to prevent nearly 400,000 child marriages in India over the last three years and rescued over 75,000 children from trafficking.

After successful, ongoing campaigns in India and Nepal, Just Rights for Children launched their global campaign to bring about a ‘Child Marriage-Free World by 2030’ on the sidelines of UNGA on September 25. This campaign is set to create the largest global civil society network to end child marriage.

“Child marriage, abuse, and violence are not just injustices: they are crimes,” said Bhuwan Ribhu, founder of Just Rights for Children. “The end of child marriage is not only possible but eminent. By coming together as a global community, we can help ensure that child marriage and abuse are fully prosecuted and prevented, not only by legal systems but by society as a whole.”

When asked about the significance of hosting this event during UNGA, Ribhu told IPS: “This is where all the world leaders are uniting, and they discussing issues that are plaguing the world today. It becomes all the more important that the world leaders sit up and take notice. That there is a pervasive crime, the crime of child rape in the name of marriage.”

“We believe that the world leaders need to unite and come together to support the enforcement of laws in their countries. They need to unite, to support the children and the youth that are coming out and demanding the end of child rape and child marriage by taking pledges.”

Nearly one in five young women aged 20-49 are married before turning 18 years old. Data from UNICEF shows that in 2023, South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa accounted for 45 percent and 20 percent respectively of the number of girls married before age 18. In India, the prevalence of child marriage was at 24 percent in 2021. Since then, this rate has dropped to less than 10 percent through the joint efforts of legal enforcement through the courts and government and through the advocacy work of civil society groups.

H.E. Dr. Fatima Maada Bio, First Lady of the Republic of Sierra Leone (middle) accepts a Champion for Children award from Just Rights for Children. Credit; Just Rights for Children

Child marriage is also associated with other negative outcomes such as the increased risk of domestic abuse, early pregnancy and maternal mortality. Lack of access to education is also at risk with girls being forced to drop out once they’ve entered a union. There is the need, therefore, to not just help these girls return to school, but also educate them on their rights and the laws meant to protect them.

Ribhu and Just Rights for Children emphasize the rule of law as the path toward ending child marriage. Other legal and human rights experts agree that at least three key steps are required: the prevention of the crime, the protection of the victims, and the prosecution of the perpetrators in order to deter future crimes. Reparations for the victims are also critical for justice and for trauma recovery.

Ribhu explained to IPS that they target the adults that aid and abet child marriages. In addition to the “groom” and family members, they also believe other members of the community should be held accountable. This includes community leaders and councils, priests that officiate the union, and even the wedding vendors that knowingly cater at weddings where the bride is underage.

“At the end of the day, we have to see that enforcement of law creates that culture of accountability, that culture of responsibility, that culture of respect, culture of consciousness, where people believe that they cannot get away with it, and so that entire impunity collapses. So child marriage is one such crime where it is happening in the open because nobody is actually stopping it,” he said.

“Today, I ask you to turn your influence towards ensuring that the law works, not just as an institution, as an ideal, but as a living and concrete instrument for the protection of children,” said Kerry Kennedy, President of RFK Human Rights. “Impunity is the oxygen in which these crimes survive. Prosecution is the antidote.”

Even though child marriage is considered morally unconscionable and is illegal across regional, national and international law, it continues to persist due to failures in the legal systems. There are other loopholes in the system that are exploited. Najat Maalla M’jid, UN Special Representative to the Secretary General on Violence Against Children, explained that some laws set the age of consent to lower than 18 years, or make it permissible through parental permission, or those marriages are not legally registered, therefore making it harder to track.

As Kennedy later told IPS, there has been “no history of accountability”. When law enforcement play their part to hold all parties accountable, this must also include police departments that fail to investigate the cases and therefore. “Nobody wants to go to jail. Everybody’s fearful of it. This is what works.”

Ribhu noted that the prevention of crime could only happen when there is respect for the rule of law. It is supposed to be this certainty of punishment that deters bad actors, and then lead to growing awareness on the evils of child marriage and prevent future cases. Deterrence must work in tandem with awareness.

The speakers at the event all emphasized that tackling child marriage and protecting the girls made vulnerable by it required cooperation across multiple groups, from legal experts to government leaders to survivors to members of the private sector such as philanthropists.

Other countries have recently taken steps to pass laws prohibiting child marriage. The Kenyan government passed the Kenya Children Act 2022 which criminalized abuses against children, including child marriage.

“Child marriage is a grave violation of girls’ human rights that threatens the future of millions of girls worldwide. Our youthful demographic in Kenya, highlights the need of sustained a national and county investments, especially in programs targeting children, youth and women,” said Carren Ageng’o, Principal Secretary, Children Services, Ministry for Gender, Culture and Children Services, Government of Kenya. In a country where nearly 51 percent of population are between the ages of 0-17, legal and social protections for the youth population are critical for its development.

Last year Sierra Leone passed the Child Marriage Prohibition Bill 2024 through efforts led by First Lady Dr. Fatima Maada Bio.

Maada said that this law “was a bold and historic step” for the country but made it clear that the “law is just the beginning.”

“Real change happens in families, in schools, in villages, and in places of worship. Real change happens when communities stand up and say, ‘not our daughter, not anymore,’” said Maada. “I do not dream of a Sierra Leone free of child marriage; I dream of a world free of child marriage. That dream is within reach if only we act now.”

Remarking on the UN General Assembly meetings hosted in UN headquarters, she went on to add: “If governments have courage, if international partners stand with us, if communities take ownership, if the leaders [behind those guarded doors] in this city of New York today…decided that the time to protect children is now.”

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There is a modest global decline in hunger since 2022. While progress is seen in Asia and South America, hunger is rising in Africa and Western Asia. Credit: Joyce Chimbi/IPS

By Joyce Chimbi
NAIROBI, Sep 25 2025 (IPS)

The 2025 State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) report shows a modest global decline in hunger since 2022, with 673 million people facing hunger in 2024, indicating a decrease of 22 million compared to 2022. While progress is seen in Asia and South America, hunger is rising in Africa and Western Asia.

This progress is nonetheless undermined by persistent food price inflation, particularly in low-income countries who were hit hardest by rising food prices, threatening vulnerable populations. The report emphasizes the need for stable markets, open trade and stronger policy coordination to secure healthy diets and reach the UN’s 2030 goals.

Isabel de la Peña, the country director for Cuba, Guatemala and the Dominican Republic for the UN’s International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) spoke to IPS about the 2025 report and, the agriculture sector, rural populations, food and nutrition security in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) region and the complex interplay of milestones and setbacks.

“The Latin America and the Caribbean region has reduced the incidence of hunger and food insecurity in the past four consecutive years and this is an important achievement. Hunger fell to 5.1 percent of the population in 2024, down from 6.1 percent in 2020,” she explained.

“And if you look at the past 20 years,” she continued, “Hunger had been steadily declining in LAC from 2005 to 2019. Then it peaked in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Since then, hunger has been steadily declining and now it’s below pre-pandemic levels. Also, if you look at food insecurity, globally, LAC has experienced the greatest reduction in the prevalence of food insecurity in recent years.”

In 2024, hunger affected about 307 million people in Africa, 323 million in Asia and 34 million in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC)—20.2, 6.7, and 5.1 percent of the population, respectively. Food insecurity has remained consistently higher in rural areas than in urban areas since 2022, with notable improvements in urban areas in Asia and across urban, peri-urban and rural areas in LAC.

Although the gender gap narrowed at the global level from 2021 to 2023, it increased slightly in 2024, with the prevalence of food insecurity remaining consistently higher among women than men, globally and across all regions. “LAC has the largest gender gap in prevalence of food insecurity as food insecurity among women is 5.3 percentage points higher than among men,” Peña said.

Further speaking about the paradox of food insecurity in rural areas where it is produced as food insecurity affects 28 percent in rural areas versus 23 percent in urban settings. IFAD invests in rural people to enable them to overcome poverty and achieve food security. Peña said approximately 33.6 million people suffer from hunger in LAC and that rural populations, rural areas and women are still the furthest left behind.

“This is an unacceptable reality,” she continued. “LAC has enormous agricultural production potential, and it’s also a net exporter of food. Even though the number of people affected by food insecurity this region fell by 9 million between 2023 and 2024, one in four people in the region is still affected by food insecurity.”

Globally, LAC has the highest cost of a healthy diet and approximately 182 million people in LAC cannot afford a healthy diet. In designing sustainable solutions, she emphasized the need to be alive to the disparities in the region.

She said the Dominican Republic faces a significant double burden of malnutrition as undernutrition coexists with high rates of overweight and obesity and, over 63 percent of the adult population is overweight or obese.

Cuba has traditionally maintained low levels of undernourishment of below 2.5 percent and, a low prevalence of stunting or chronic child malnutrition. Peña attributes the milestone to “universal social protection and food distribution systems. But in the last five years, there’s been a drastic reduction in the production of staple foods, and also a decreased availability and resources to import food. Families are now receiving fewer state rations.”

“Guatemala is one of the countries in the region with the worst food security and nutrition situation as one in two people are food insecure, and chronic child malnutrition or stunting affects 44.6 percent of children under five. This is the highest rate in the region and one of the highest in the world and it’s even higher when we look at indigenous peoples and rural populations,” she said.

Cautioning that chronic child malnutrition or stunting has long-lasting lifelong consequences as it can impair brain development, reduce school performance, productive capacity and ability to earn an income and ultimately limit a child’s future contribution to the social and economic development of their country.

“The Dominican Republic is a success story in terms of reducing hunger, as prevalence has fallen below 3.6 percent. It used to be almost 22 percent 20 years ago. Still, 18 percent of the population is food insecure, and 23 percent cannot afford a healthy diet,” she emphasized.

All the same, agricultural challenges in the Dominican Republic include a lack of proper irrigation due to poorly maintained irrigation systems, blocked waterways and declining groundwater levels. Further afield in the Island nation of Cuba, there is an over-dependence on imports, as the country imports 60 to 70 percent of its food requirements.

Overall, she stated that climate change is an increasing threat, disrupting food systems, agricultural productivity, and supply chains, further exacerbating “food insecurity and malnutrition as LAC is the second most exposed region in the world to climate change.”

“These extreme weather events and climate variability really reduce agricultural productivity. They affect yields, they damage crops, they can also disrupt supply chains, leading to food prices rise and healthy diets becoming less accessible,” she said.

Further highlighting the urgent need to invest in climate change adaptation, she spoke of the droughts induced by La Niña in between 2020 and 2023 in Argentina that resulted in a 35 percent drop in wheat production and a dramatic fall in exports leading to international wheat price spikes as Argentina is a major wheat exporter.

Peña emphasised that this backdrop is particularly concerning for IFAD and heightens the need to work with “small-scale farmers and poor households, because those are the ones that are more vulnerable to high food prices. And, poor households spend a larger share of the income on food, so they are more vulnerable to these fluctuations.”

Stressing that for small-scale producers, any kind of rise in food prices outweigh the potential gains that that they can obtain from selling their produce. Overall, other prevailing challenges in LAC are linked to low agricultural productivity, limited access to financial services, low technology adoption and the aging of rural populations as the youth migrate to urban settings.

“We need to redouble our efforts and focus on investments in the populations that are being left behind such as rural areas and women and this is really at the core of what IFAD does in LAC. We have over 26 projects in the region with an investment of USD2.5 billion between IFAD resources and co-financing,” she emphasised.

These projects aim at promoting food and agricultural production and tackling climate change with a special focus on rural populations, small-scale producers, women, and indigenous communities who are still the furthest left behind in the journey towards zero hunger.

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