The $683 million will be used for efforts towards women’s reproductive and sexual health rights across 57 countries, of which about $300 million will be directed towards UNFPA’s projects in Arab state regions, including countries such as Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Sudan, and Somalia. Credit: Abdurrahman Warsameh/IPS

By Samira Sadeque
UNITED NATIONS, Feb 7 2020 (IPS)

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) is appealing for $683million in their mission to address sexual and reproductive health services for women and girls in conflict areas in the world. 

At the Humanitarian Action Overview 2020, launched on Thursday, the sexual and reproductive health agency highlighted the urgency with which the issue should be treated. 

With more than 168 million people currently requiring humanitarian assistance in the world, UNFPA projects 45 million women, girls and young people will be affected by some kind of conflict this year. 

For women and girls, sexual and health reproductive health rights have often come as secondary priority in crisis situations, but experts say it’s time to make them a primary concern. 

“[These] types of service have long time been forgotten,” Arthur Erken, Director of UNFPA Division of Communications and Strategic Partnerships (DCS), told IPS. “It should not be an afterthought, it should be part and parcel of [the whole concern].”  

“We’re focusing on women and what they’re going through because they’re on the front lines,”  Ann Erb Leoncavallo of UNFPA told IPS. “They’re trying to take care of their children, they’re getting pregnant, they’re having babies, they’re getting bombed, they’re suffering from floods, high waters, you name it.”

Leoncavallo added that many of the women in areas of conflict might head single-parent households or have their own trauma. “They get depression, they get traumatised because they faced increased of gender-based violence,” she said.  

The $683 million will be used for efforts towards women’s reproductive and sexual health rights across 57 countries, of which about $300 million will be directed towards  UNFPA’s projects in Arab state regions, including countries such as Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Sudan, and Somalia. 

In order to help women reach out for help, unlearn their shame and stigma, UNFPA is currently working with a “safe space” for many women to take a break from their everyday activities. 

The “women and girl safe spaces” is dedicated space in the refugee camps where women can come and meet with other women, share notes, relax, and have a safe environment to discuss concerns and ask for help, Erken explained.

“It’s safe, men are not allowed,” Erken said, adding that the purpose of the space is to put a lot of attention to calming women, giving them breathing space, and often counselling services.

He says there doesn’t seem to be any stigma about women coming into these spaces, pointing out refugee camps in Jordan that have the facility. He learned from some of the service providers the women do visit, when their kids are in school and their husband occupied. 

Dr. Afrah Thabet Al-Ademi, a UNFPA medical doctor in Yemen who works with women who have escaped conflict, says education has a role to play in destigmatising these services for refugee population.

A staggering $100.5 million is being requested specifically for the crisis in Yemen, the highest on the list provided by UNFPA.

“A lot of women who are not educated, who feel targeted, and feel stigma to talk about their needs or family planning,” Al-Ademi told IPS. 

She recalls one time when she was meeting with a woman who had just given birth and who had covered her baby with a headscarf. 

“When she exposed the baby, I found that she covered the baby with a newsletter, she didn’t have clothes,” Al-Ademi told IPS. 

As a result, UNFPA in Yemen is now developing a kit specifically for mothers of new borns, to be put in “health facility for any woman who comes in for deliver”.

“The clothes is like a dignity for her,” said Al-Ademi.

The “Mama Kit” has clothes for the baby, pads for the mother, blankets, and diapers, among other things for the newborn. 

UNFPA is also allocating funds for Democratic Republic of Congo, Syria, Sudan, Bangladesh, and Venezuela to assist with sexual and reproductive health for the women in those countries.

Babatunde Osotimehin, Executive Director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). Credit: UN Photo/Paulo Filgueiras

By Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin
UNITED NATIONS, May 20 2015 (IPS)

Seventy years ago, with the founding of the United Nations, all nations reaffirmed their faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, and in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small.

The commitment to fundamental human rights that was enshrined in the United Nations Charter and later in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights lives on today in many other treaties and agreements, including the Programme of Action of the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development.There is a wealth of indisputable evidence that when sexual and reproductive health is integrated into broader economic and social development initiatives, it can have a positive multiplier effect on sustainable development and the well-being of entire nations.

The Programme of Action (PoA) , endorsed by 179 governments, articulated a bold new vision about the relationships between population, development and individual well-being.

And it was remarkable in its recognition that reproductive health and rights, as well as women’s empowerment and gender equality, are the foundation for economic and social development.

The PoA is also rooted in principles of human rights and respect for national sovereignty and various religious and cultural backgrounds. It is also based on the human right of individuals and couples to freely determine the number of their children and to have the information and means to do so.

Since it began operations 46 years ago, and guided by the PoA since 1994, the United Nations Population Fund has promoted dignity and individual rights, including reproductive rights.

Reproductive rights encompass freedoms and entitlements involving civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights.

The right to decide the number and spacing of children is integral to reproductive rights and to other basic human rights, including the right to health, particularly sexual and reproductive health, the right to privacy, the right to equality and non-discrimination and the right to liberty and the security of person.

Reproductive rights rest not only on the recognition of the right of couples and individuals to plan their families, but also on the right to attain the highest standard of sexual and reproductive health.

The impact of the PoA has been nothing short of revolutionary for the hundreds of millions of women who have over the past 21 years gained the power and the means to avoid or delay a pregnancy.

The results of the rights-based approach to sexual and reproductive health, including voluntary family planning, have been extraordinary. Millions more women have become empowered to have fewer children and to start their families later in life, giving them the opportunity to complete their schooling, earn a better living and rise out of poverty.

And now there is a wealth of indisputable evidence that when sexual and reproductive health is integrated into broader economic and social development initiatives, it can have a positive multiplier effect on sustainable development and the well-being of entire nations.

Recent research shows that investments in the human capital of young people, partly by ensuring their right to health, including sexual and reproductive health, can help nations with large youth populations realize a demographic dividend.

The dividend can help lift millions of people out of poverty and bolster economic growth and national development. If sub-Saharan Africa realized a demographic dividend on a scale realized by East Asia in the 1980s and 1990s, the region could experience an economic miracle of its own.

The principles of equality, inalienable rights, and dignity embodied in the United Nations Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Programme of Action are relevant today, as the international community prepares to launch a 15-year global sustainable development initiative that builds on and advances the objectives of the Millennium Development Goals, which come to a close later this year.

The new Post-2015 Global Sustainable Development Agenda is founded on principles of equality, rights and dignity.

Upholding these principles and achieving each of the proposed 17 new Sustainable Development Goals require upholding reproductive rights and the right to health, including sexual and reproductive health.

Achieving the proposed goal to ensure healthy lives and promoting well-being for all at all ages, for example, depends in part on whether individuals have the power and the means to prevent unintended pregnancy or a sexually transmitted infection, including HIV.

Human rights have guided the United Nations along the path to sustainability since the Organisation’s inception in 1945. Rights, including reproductive rights, have guided UNFPA along that same path for decades.

As we observe the 70th anniversary of the United Nations and look forward to the post-2015 development agenda, we must prioritise the promotion and protection of human rights and dignity for every person, for current and future generations, to create the future we want.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

Excerpt:

By Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin
UNITED NATIONS, Nov 26 2014 (IPS)

The tragic deaths and injuries of women following sterilisation in the Indian state of Chhattisgarh have sparked global media coverage and public concern and outrage.

Now we must ensure that such a tragedy never occurs again.

Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin. Credit: UNFPA

The women underwent surgery went with the best intentions – hoping they were doing the right thing for themselves and their families.

Now their husbands, children and parents are left to live without them, reeling with deep sadness, shock and mourning.

The only way to respond to such a tragedy is with compassion and constructive action, with a focus on human rights and human dignity.

Every person has the right to health. And this includes sexual and reproductive health—for safe motherhood, for preventing and treating HIV and other sexually transmitted infections, and for family planning.

Taking a human rights-based approach to family planning means protecting the health and the ability of women and men to make their own free and fully informed choices.

All family planning services should be of quality, freely chosen with full information and consent, amongst a full range of modern contraceptive methods, without any form of coercion or incentives.

The world agreed on these principles 20 years ago in Cairo at the International Conference on Population and Development.

Governments also agreed on the goals to achieve universal education and reproductive health by 2015, to reduce child and maternal mortality, and to promote gender equality and the empowerment of women.As we mourn the loss of the women who died in India, we must make sure that no more women suffer such a fate.

The Cairo Conference shifted the focus away from human numbers to human beings and our rights and choices.

Family planning is a means for individuals to voluntarily control their own bodies, their fertility and their futures.

Research and experience show that when given information and access to family planning, women and men choose to have the number of children they want. Most of the time, they choose smaller families. And this has benefits that extend beyond the family to the community and nation.

Family planning is one of the best investments a country can make. And taking a holistic and rights-based approach is essential to sustainable development.

We know that it is important to tackle harmful norms that discriminate against women and girls. This means, first of all, providing quality public education, and making sure that girls stay in school.

Second, we must empower women to participate in decisions of their families, communities and nations.

Third, we must reduce child mortality so parents have confidence their children will survive to adulthood.

And fourth, we must ensure every woman’s and man’s ability to plan their family and enjoy reproductive health and rights.

As we mourn the loss of the women who died in India, we must make sure that no more women suffer such a fate.

The organisation that I lead, UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund, supports a human rights-based approach to family planning, and efforts to ensure safe motherhood, promote gender equality and end violence against women and girls.

In all of these areas, India has taken positive steps forward. One such step is the development of appropriate clinical standards for delivering family planning and sterilisation services.

When performed according to appropriate clinical standards with full, free and informed consent, amongst a full range of contraceptive options, sterilisation is safe, effective and ethical. It is an important option for women and couples.

Yet much work remains to be done in every country in the world to ensure universal sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights.

The recent events in India highlight the need for improved monitoring and service provision, with the participation of community members and civil society, to ensure that policies are implemented, and to guarantee that services meet national and international standards.

Already the prime minister has quickly initiated investigations, a medical team was sent to the site, and a judicial commission was appointed by the state government to investigate the deaths of the women. I commend them for this immediate response.

Several people, including the doctor who conducted the surgeries and the owner of the firm that produced the suspected medicines, have been arrested. There is every hope that those responsible will be held accountable.

There is also hope that the government will take further measures to restore public confidence in its family planning programs as it upholds the human rights, choices and dignity of women and men.

Any laws, procedures or protocols that might have allowed or contributed to the deaths and other human rights violations should be reformed or changed to prevent recurrences.

As the world’s largest democracy, India is home to more than 1.2 billion people and recognised as a global leader in medicine, science and technology.

Given its leadership and expertise, India can ensure that family planning programmes meet, or exceed, clinical and human rights standards throughout the country.

UNFPA and many partners stand ready to support such an effort.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

Excerpt:

Shahida Amin, a young Pakistani woman, brings her 10-month-old son to school every day. Credit: Farooq Ahmed/IPS

By Joan Erakit
UNITED NATIONS, Oct 4 2014 (IPS)

The Programme of Action adopted at the landmark 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) included chapters that defined concrete actions covering some 44 dimensions of population and development, including the need to provide for women and girls during times of conflict, the urgency of investments in young people’s capabilities, and the importance of women’s political participation and representation.

The diversity of issues addressed by the Programme of Action (PoA) provided the opportunity for states to develop and implement a “comprehensive and integrated agenda”.

In reality, governments and development agencies have been selective in their actions, and many have taken a sectoral approach to implementation, which has resulted in fragmented successes rather than holistic gains.

Few are better placed to reflect on progress made over the last two decades than the executive director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin.

Excerpts from the interview follow.

Q: In 1994 you were advocating for reproductive health and rights at the first ICPD in Cairo. Twenty years later, you are leading UNFPA as its executive director. What has that journey looked like for you?

A: The last four years have opened me up to the challenges that the organisation and the mandate itself have faced. Twenty years ago, we were able to secure commitments from governments on various aspects of poverty reduction, but more importantly the empowerment of women and girls and young people, including their reproductive rights – but the battle is not over.

Today, we are on the cusp of a new development agenda and we, as custodians of this agenda, need to locate it within the conversation of sustainable development – a people-centred agenda based on human rights is the only feasible way of achieving sustainable development.

Q: What were some of the biggest challenges that the ICPD Programme of Action faced in its early years?

Babatunde Osotimehin, executive director of UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund. Credit: UNFPA

A: I think that Cairo was very cognizant of the status of women in society. It was also cognizant of the status of girls – particularly of young adults, and of the issues of sexuality and the power struggle between men and women over who decides on the sexuality of women.

The battle is not strictly about a woman’s ability to control her fertility, but it goes beyond the issue of fertility and decision-making. Women still earn less than men for doing the same job. There is no proportional representation in politics of women, and in the most severe cases, little girls don’t go to school as much as boys.

That is a continuous struggle, and our job is to ensure that gender equality in the very strict sense is accomplished, so we achieve what I always refer to as a “gender neutral” society.

Q: The Demographic Dividend is going to be an important focus in the post-2015 development agenda. How will UNFPA work to assess and meet the needs of young people?

A: We are already doing it!

Of course, we are going to strengthen and scale up our work. We don’t pretend that UNFPA can provide all the inputs needed to reap the dividend. But raising the bar and promoting youth visibility and participation at the political level is something that we will be doing with member states and partners.

For example, how do we ensure that we can partner with UNESCO, to continue to do the good work they are doing in terms of education – particularly with girls’ education? And how can we partner with ILO [the International Labour Organisation] to ensure that we have job creation, skills and all of the things that enable young people to come into the job market to get the opportunities they are looking for?

How do we ensure that within member states themselves, we’re creating spaces that enable young people to feel that they are part of the system?

It is impossible to get the kind of rapid development we’re looking at if member states do not accept the principles of comprehensive sexuality education, and do not accept that young people should also be exposed to information and services about contraception.

Q: How will you respond to women and girls in conflict areas, especially pregnant women or those who have faced violence and abuse?

A: That’s something we do superbly. We are also conscious of the fact that the world may see more crises. Today, we are looking at Gaza, we are looking at Syria, we are looking at Iraq, we are looking at the Central African Republic, we are looking at South Sudan, we are looking at old conflict areas in the world, which are still there. We cannot forget the IDPs [Internally Displaced Persons] who have existed for so long in northern Kenya, in the Zaatari Camp in Jordan, these are areas where we work actively.

We offer three types of response: services for girls and women to prevent GBV [gender-based violence]; services for the survivors of GBV, so that they can receive care for the physical assault; and services for their emotional and psychological support so that they are reintegrated back into the society.

We provide education, antenatal care, delivery services and postnatal care for women in camps and mothers around the world.

Our flagship programme, before we expanded to all of this, was recognising that women in conflict areas have dignity needs. Very few people think of women and their regular needs in war and conflict, so we provide them dignity kits, to enable them to preserve their health and dignity.

Something UNFPA has been trying to do more is increase attention to and prevent GBV and talk about it in such a way that we can show that it’s actually more prevalent than it is assumed, not only in conflict, but in domestic circumstances as well.

This story originally appeared in a special edition TerraViva, ‘ICPD@20: Tracking Progress, Exploring Potential for Post-2015’, published with the support of UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund. The contents are the independent work of reporters and authors.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

Excerpt:

A traffic jam in Jaciara, Brazil, caused by repairs to the BR-364 road. Credit: Mario Osava/IPS

By Diana Cariboni
MONTEVIDEO, Oct 2 2014 (IPS)

“We could be the last Latin American and Caribbean generation living together with hunger.”

The assertion, made by Raúl Benítez, a regional officer for the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), shows one side of the coin: only 4.6 percent of the region’s population is undernourished, according to the latest figures.

By 2030, however, most of the countries in the region will face a serious risk situation due to climate change.

With almost 600 million inhabitants, Latin America and the Caribbean has a third of the world’s fresh water and more than a quarter of its medium to high potential farmland, points out a book published this year by the Inter-American Development Bank in partnership with Global Harvest Initiative, a private-sector think-tank.

It is the largest net food-exporting region, while it uses just a fraction of its agricultural potential for both consuming and exporting.

But almost a quarter of the region’s rural people still live on less than two dollars a day, and the region is prone to disasters (earthquakes, hurricanes, floods and droughts), some of them exacerbated by climate change.

Global warming poses serious challenges to the international community’s goal of eradicating poverty and hunger. Changes in rainfall patterns, soils and temperatures are already stressing agricultural systems.

Currently, more than 800 million people worldwide are at risk of hunger. Through its devastating impact on crops and livelihoods, climate change is predicted to increase that number by as much as 20 percent by 2050, according to a recent United Nations report.

Changes in temperature and rainfall patterns could lead to food price rises of between three percent and 84 percent by 2050, thereby feeding a vicious cycle of poverty and inequality.

Oxfam reports that in the more extreme scenarios, heat and water stress could reduce crop yields by 25 percent between 2030 and 2049.

Climate change is likely to impact mostly small and family farmers, who produce more than half the food in the region and have inadequate resources with which to deal with unpredictable weather.

Despite this looming threat, strategies for sustainability are far from clear. Regional drivers of growth are export-oriented commodities, and while some sectors have advanced in added value, technology and innovation, natural resources exploitation is still the key of the whole regional boom.

By 2011, raw materials and commodities accounted for 60 percent of regional exports, compared to 40 percent in 2000. At the same time, this growth of commodities exports led to a replacement of domestic manufactures by imported goods, affecting manufacturing industries in the region.

In rural areas, conflicting models of small farming and extensive monocultures based on genetically modified seeds compete for the land in a David versus Goliath fight.

In Paraguay, the fourth largest exporter of soybeans in the world, 1.6 percent of owners hold 80 percent of the agricultural land. In Guatemala, eight percent of producers own 82 percent of farmlands, while 80 percent of productive land in Colombia is in the hands of 14 percent of landowners, according to Oxfam.

Agriculture and related deforestation are major sources of greenhouse gasses (GHG) in Latin America, though other sources are growing rapidly. Brazil, for example, is joining the club of big polluters, with the burning of fossil fuels accounting for the majority of its GHG emissions in the last five years.

As the extractive industries grow, they demand more highways, railroads and ports, putting pressure on governments to avoid the so-called logistics blackout.

Energy demand is increasing too, not only from industries, but also from millions of people lifted out of poverty, and thus with larger consumption needs. The region’s energy demand for the period 2010-2017 increases at an annual rate of five percent.

The region is poised to cross a new fossil fuel frontier, when Argentina, Brazil and Mexico overcome their own political, financial and technical challenges to exploit substantial reserves of unconventional hydrocarbons, like the Argentinian Vaca Muerta geological formation or the pre-salt layer located in the Brazilian continental shelf.

It is difficult to argue that a region so rich in natural resources has no right to thrive on the demand and supply of commodities, particularly when the resulting fiscal revenues have allowed impoverished countries like Bolivia to drastically reduce extreme poverty numbers (from 38 percent in 2005 to 20 percent in 2013).

However, experts warn this path is unsustainable and climate change impacts, felt across the region, can undermine any social gain.

In Guatemala, the worst drought in 40 years is putting 1.2 million people at risk of suffering hunger in the next months. Those who suffer the worst impacts of unsustainable development models will ironically be those who contribute the least to global warming.

A recent U.N. document summarising actions for the follow-up to the programme of action adopted at the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) found that only about a “third of the world’s population could be considered as having consumption profiles that contribute to emissions.”

Fewer than one billion of them have a significant impact, while “a smaller minority is responsible for an overwhelming share of the damage,” the report added.

Still, it will be the poorest people who will bear the brunt, and Latin America, dubbed ‘the next global breadbasket’, is in desperate need of strong local and global action towards the goal of achieving sustainable development in the next decade.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

Contraceptives on sale at a store in Sanaa, Yemen. Credit: Rebecca Murray/IPS

By Joseph Chamie
NEW YORK, Oct 1 2014 (IPS)

For most of human history, reproductive rights essentially meant men and women accepting the number, timing and spacing of their children, as well as possible childlessness. All this changed radically in the second half of the 20th century with the introduction of new medical technologies aimed at both preventing and assisting human reproduction.

Those technologies ushered in historic changes in reproductive rights and behaviour that continue to reverberate around the world, giving rise to increasingly complex theological, ethical and legal concerns that need to be addressed.New reproductive technologies have given rise to serious theological, ethical and legal concerns that have not been satisfactorily addressed.

Up until around the middle of the past century, reproductive rights were limited. The available birth control methods were rhythm, coitus interruptus (withdrawal), condoms and for some, the diaphragm.

Those methods in too many instances were unreliable and not considered user friendly. Also, while induced abortion has been practiced for ages, it was a drastic, dangerous and largely unlawful medical procedure.

In 1960, the oral contraceptive pill was introduced, dramatically transforming women’s reproductive rights and behaviour. In addition to the pill, modern methods of family planning, including the intra uterine device (IUD), injectables, implants, emergency contraceptive pills and sterilisation, have given women and men effective control over procreation.

Modern contraceptives have contributed to major changes in sexual behaviour and marriage. Women empowered with modern contraception can choose without the fear of pregnancy whether to have sexual relationships, enabling them to postpone childbearing or avoid it altogether.

And instead of marriage, cohabitation has become increasingly prevalent among many young couples, especially in industrialised countries.

The use of modern contraceptives also facilitated a rapid decline in family size worldwide. Between 1950 and the close of the 20th century, the world’s total fertility rate fell from five children per woman to nearly half that level.

Every major region of the world experienced fertility declines during that half century, with the greatest occurring in Asia and Latin America and the smallest in Africa.

With improved medical techniques, changing social norms and grassroots movements, induced abortion also became increasingly legalised globally. Although some remain strongly opposed to induced abortion, nearly all industrialised countries have passed laws ensuring a woman’s right to abortion.

Also at the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), 179 governments indicated their commitment to prevent unsafe abortion and in circumstances where abortion is not against the law, such abortion should be made safe.

Reproductive rights to terminate a pregnancy, however, have also led to excess female fetus abortions. Particularly widespread in China and India, their sex ratios at birth of 117 and 111 boys per 100 girls are blatantly higher than the typical sex ratio at birth of around 106.

Consequently, the numbers of young “surplus males” unable to find brides are more than 35 million in China and 25 million in India.

The introduction in 1970 of in vitro fertilisation (IVF) – fertilisation in a laboratory by mixing sperm with eggs surgically removed from an ovary followed by uterine implantation – radically altered the basic evolutionary process of human reproduction.

IVF provides childless couples the right and means to have biological children. It is estimated that more than five million IVF babies have followed since the birth of the first “test-tube baby” in 1978.

However, IVF has also raised ethical concerns. In addition to creating a pregnancy through “artificial” means, IVF has become a massive commercial industry prone to serious abuses and exploitation of vulnerable couples in the desire to make profits from childbearing.

IVF also permits gestational surrogacy, which extends reproductive rights to same-sex couples. In contrast to traditional surrogacy, where the surrogate is the actual mother, gestational surrogacy allows the surrogate to be unrelated to the baby with the egg coming from the intended mother or donor.

While those who are childless have a right to have biological children, gestational surrogacy raises challenging ethical questions, such as the exploitation of poor women, as well as complex legal issues, especially when transactions cross international borders.

In 1997, the cloning – or propagation by self-replication rather than through sexual reproduction – of the first mammal, Dolly the sheep, was achieved. The birth of Dolly was a major reproductive development.

Following the cloning of Dolly, scores of other animals, including fish, mice, cows, horses, dogs and monkeys, have been successfully cloned. These developments suggest that in the near future some humans may wish to assert their reproductive rights to be cloned, again raising serious theological, ethical and legal questions.

Among the transhumanist reproductive technologies imagined in the more distant future, one that stands out is ectogenesis, or the development of a fetus outside the human womb in an artificial uterus.

While ectogenesis may expand the extent of fetal viability, free women from childbearing and expand reproductive rights, it poses serious, unexplored medical, ethical and legal issues.

During the past half-century remarkable technological progress has been made in human reproduction. As a result of this medical progress, women and men have acquired wide-ranging reproductive rights and technologies to determine the number, timing and spacing of their children and to overcome childlessness with biological offspring.

The new reproductive technologies, however, have also given rise to serious theological, ethical and legal concerns that have not been satisfactorily addressed. Anticipated future medical breakthroughs in human reproduction make it even more imperative for the international community of nations to address the growing challenges and concerns regarding reproductive technologies and rights.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

Excerpt:

Women in the north Indian village of Katra Shadatganj in the state of Uttar Pradesh, where two young girls were recently raped and hanged. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS

By Stella Paul
CHIRANG, India, Sep 30 2014 (IPS)

On a bright March morning, a 17-year old tribal girl woke as usual, and went to catch fish in the village river in the Chirang district of India’s northeastern Assam state.

Later that evening, villagers found her lifeless body on the riverbank. According to Taburam Pegu, the police officer investigating the case, her assailants had raped her before slitting her throat.

The girl was a member of the Bodo tribe, which has been at loggerheads with Muslims and Santhals – another indigenous group in the region. The tragic story reveals a terrible reality across India, where thousands of girls and women are sexually abused, tortured and murdered in a tide of gender-based violence (GBV) that shows no sign of slowing.

“We have a culture of impunity. Our legal system itself negates the possibility [...] of punishment in cases of violence against women.” -- Anjuman Ara Begum, former programme officer at the Asian Human Rights Commission
Conflict and a lack of accountability, particularly across India’s northern, eastern and central states where armed insurgencies and tribal clashes are a part of daily life for over 40 million women, fuel the fire of sexual violence.

According to a report released earlier this year by the United Nations Secretary-General assessing progress on the programme of action adopted at the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo, violence against women is universal, with one in every three women (35 percent) experiencing physical or sexual abuse in her lifetime.

Of all the issues related to the ICPD action plan, ending gender-based violence was addressed as a key concern by 88 percent of all governments surveyed. In total, 97 percent of countries worldwide have programmes, policies or strategies to address gender equality, human rights, and the empowerment of women.

Still, multiple forms of violence against women continue to be an hourly occurrence all around the world.

A recent multi-country study on men and violence in the Asia-Pacific region, conducted by the United Nations, reported that nearly 50 percent of 10,000 men surveyed admitted to sexually or physically abusing a female partner.

In India, a country that has established a legal framework to address and end sexual violence, 92 women are raped every day, according to the latest records published by the government’s National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB).

This is higher than the average daily number of rapes reported in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which currently stands at 36.

Sexual violence is particularly on the rise in conflict areas, experts say, largely due to a lack of accountability – the very thing the United Nations describes as “key to preventing and responding to gender-based violence.”

According to Suhas Chakma, director of the Asian Centre for Human Rights in New Delhi, “There are human rights abuses committed by security forces and human rights violations by the militants. And then there is also violence against women committed by civilians. No matter who is committing the crime […] there has to be accountability – a component completely missing” from the current legal framework.

An example of this is Perry*, a 35-year-old woman from the South Garo Hills district of India’s northeastern Meghalaya state – home to 14 million women and three armed groups – who was killed by militants in June this year.

Members of the Garo National Liberation Army (GNLA), an insurgent group, allegedly tried to rape Perry and, when she resisted, they shot her in the head, blowing it open. The GNLA refused to be held accountable, claiming that the woman was an informant and so “deserved to die”.

Another reason for the high levels of GBV in India is the dismal conviction rate – a mere 26 percent – in cases involving sexual assault and violence.

In 3,860 of the 5,337 rape cases reported in the past 10 years, the culprits were either acquitted or discharged by the courts for lack of ‘proper’ evidence, according to the NCRB.

“We have a culture of impunity,” Anjuman Ara Begum, a Guwahati-based lawyer and former programme officer at the Asian Human Rights Commission, told IPS, adding, “Our legal system itself negates the possibility or certainty of punishment in cases of violence against women.”

With a declining conviction rate, armed groups have been playing the role of the judiciary to deliver instant justice. In October 2011, a kangaroo court of the armed Maoists in the Palamu district of India’s eastern Jharkhand state cut off the hands of a man accused of rape.

In August 2013, the Kangleipak Communist Party (KCP) – an insurgent group operating in the northeastern state of Manipur – launched an “anti-rape task force”.

Sanakhomba Meitei, the secretary of KCP, told IPS over the phone that his group would deliver fast-track justice for rape victims. “Our intervention [will] instill fear in the [minds of the] rapists,” said Meitei, adding, “We will deliver stringent punishment.”

This is a worrying trend, but inevitable, given the failure of the legal system to deliver justice in these troubled areas, according to A L Sharada, director of Population First – a partner of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in India.

“What we need is a robust legal system, and mob justice hurts that possibility. In fact, such non-judicial justice systems are also very patriarchal in nature and ultimately against women. What we really need are quick convictions [in] every case of gender violence that has been filed,” Sharada stated.

According to the NCRB over 50,000 women were abducted across the country in 2013 alone, while over 8,000 were killed in dowry-related crimes. More than 100,000 women faced cruelty at the hands of their husbands or other male relatives, but only 16 percent of those accused were convicted.

*Not her real name

This story originally appeared in a special edition TerraViva, ‘ICPD@20: Tracking Progress, Exploring Potential for Post-2015’, published with the support of UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund. The contents are the independent work of reporters and authors.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

Samoan mother Siera Tifa Palemene receives financial support from her sons who emigrated to Australia and New Zealand for employment opportunities. Credit: Catherine Wilson/IPS

By Catherine Wilson
APIA, Sep 29 2014 (IPS)

The small South Pacific island state of Samoa, located northeast of Fiji, attracts tourists with its beaches, natural beauty and relaxed pace of life, but similar to other small nations with constrained economies, it is experiencing an exodus of young people, who are unable to find jobs.

Samoa has a net migration rate of -13.4, while in neighbouring Tonga it is -15.4 and in the western Pacific island state of Micronesia it is -15.7, in contrast to the average in small island developing states (SIDS) of -1.4.

In Apia, Samoa’s capital, Siera Tifa Palemene, a fit, active woman in her late sixties, is one of many mothers to have watched her children migrate to larger economies in the region.

Palemene presides over an extensive family, with five sons and five daughters. Four of her married sons, now in their thirties, live in Australia and New Zealand, where they work in construction and building trades, such as welding.

“A lot of our people are migrating overseas to earn a living, leaving behind their parents, so there are elderly people now who have no-one living with them." -- Tala Mauala, secretary-general of the Samoa Red Cross Society
“The salaries are too low here in Samoa and my children have large families,” Palemene told IPS, emphasising that one of her sons has seven children. “My sons want their children to get a better life because over here there are not that many opportunities.”

Contraceptive prevalence in Samoa is an estimated 29 percent and the total fertility rate is 4.2, one of the highest in the region. However, while the country has a high natural population increase rate of two percent, emigration reduces population growth to 0.8 percent. Emigrants residing predominantly in Australia, New Zealand and the United States number an estimated 120,400, which nearly matches Samoa’s population of 190,372.

Twenty years after the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) held in Cairo in 1994, many small island states are still striving for sustainable economic development, equality and employment growth to match bulging youth populations.

Despite stable governance, Samoa’s economy, dependent on agriculture, tourism and international development assistance, suffers from geographic isolation from main markets. It was also impacted by the 2008 global financial crisis, an earthquake and tsunami in 2009 and Cyclone Evan in 2012, which damaged infrastructure and crops.

Livelihoods for most people centre on fishing, subsistence and smallholder agriculture, as well as small commercial and informal trading, with an estimated 27 percent of households striving to meet basic needs.

International migration, therefore, is an important avenue to economic fulfilment for young educated people with increased lifestyle aspirations and there are benefits for family members living in Samoa, such as remittances.

“My sons send money to help out the family; this helps pay all the household bills, such as electricity, and to send the grandchildren here to school,” Palemene said. According to the World Bank, remittances to Samoa in 2012 were an estimated 142 million dollars, or about 23 percent of gross domestic product (GDP).

As Palemene’s offspring face more expenses with their own families, remittances are becoming infrequent.

“I know they have their families to support and that life overseas is very expensive with so much to pay for, but when I need it, I call them and they give me money,” she said.

Still, Palemene, who receives a state pension of 135 tala (about 57 dollars) per month, works as a housekeeper at a guesthouse in Apia for extra income.

She supports the decision of her sons to emigrate and is keen for them to “have their own good future,” but added, “The only thing is that I worry that something might happen to them when they are so far away.”

Elderly relatives who remain in Samoa also face vulnerabilities when the social safety net traditionally provided by the younger generation in extended families is diminished.

“A lot of our people are migrating overseas to earn a living, leaving behind their parents, so there are elderly people now who have no-one living with them,” Tala Mauala, secretary-general of the Samoa Red Cross Society, observed. So, in times of natural disaster, for example, they need extra forms of community or state assistance.

There are other losses for high emigration countries such as the outward flow of educated professionals, known as the ‘brain drain’, due to the lure of higher salaries in the developed world, making it more difficult to progress much needed infrastructure and public service development. In Samoa the emigration rate of those with a tertiary education is 76.4 percent.

According to UNESCO, remittances are also primarily spent on consumption, rather than contributing to productivity, and the state’s trade deficit has grown as families in Samoa with additional disposable cash demand more imported goods.

Palemene sees her children when they pay her airfare to visit them or when they attend family events, such as weddings, in Samoa, but she doubts they will return to live permanently in the beautiful Polynesian country.

This story originally appeared in a special edition TerraViva, ‘ICPD@20: Tracking Progress, Exploring Potential for Post-2015’, published with the support of UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund. The contents are the independent work of reporters and authors.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

By Julitta Onabanjo, Benoit Kalasa, and Mohamed Abdel-Ahad
JOHANNESBURG, Sep 21 2014 (IPS)

Different issues will be competing for the attention of different African leaders attending the 69th United Nations General Assembly Special Session on International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) Beyond 2014 in New York on Sep 22.

But the central question for Africa’s development today is this: How do we harness the dividend from the continent’s current youthful population?

Solving this issue has never been more fundamental to Africa’s development than it is today.

For decades many, African countries have come up with a variety of ‘development’ plans. But often missing in these documents is how best to harness the potential of the youthful population for the transformation of the continent.

Therefore, strategic investment to harness the potential of the youth population can no longer wait.“African governments must know that efforts to create a demographic dividend are likely to fail as long as vast portions of young females are denied their rights, including their right to education, health and civil participation, and their reproductive rights”

The groundswell for change

Africa is undergoing important demographic changes, which provide immense economic opportunities. Currently, there are 251 million adolescents aged 10-19 years in Africa compared with 1.2 billion worldwide, which means that around one in five adolescents in the world comes from Africa.

Africa’s working age population is growing and increasing the continent’s productive potential. If mortality continues to decline and fertility declines rapidly, the current high child dependency burden will reduce drastically. The result of such change is an opportunity for the active and employed youth to invest more.  With declining death rates, the working age population in Africa will increase from about 54 percent of the population in 2010 to a peak of about 64 percent in 2090.

This increase in the working age population will also create a window of opportunity  that, if properly harnessed, should translate into higher economic growth for Africa, yielding what is now termed a ‘demographic dividend’ – or accelerated economic growth spurred by a change in the age structure of the population.

Reaping the demographic dividend requires investments in job creation, health including sexual and reproductive health and family planning, education and skill and development, which would lead to increasing per capita income.

Due to low dependency ratio, individuals and families will be able to make savings, which translate into investment and boost economic growth. This is how East Asian countries (Asian Tigers) were able to capitalise on their demographic window during the period 1965 and 1990.

The impact of such a demographic transition on economic growth is no longer questionable – it is simply a fact.

But this transformation requires that appropriate policies, strategies, programs and projects are in place to ensure that a demographic dividend can be reaped from the youth bulge.

Seizing the moment

Without concerted action, many African countries could instead face a backlash from the growing numbers of disgruntled and unemployed youth that will emerge.

In the worst-case scenario, such a demographic transition could translate into an army of unemployed youth and significantly increase social risks and tensions.

To seize the opportunity, African states will need to focus their investments in a number of critical areas. A priority will be the education and training of their youth.

African governments must know that efforts to create a demographic dividend are likely to fail as long as vast portions of young females are denied their rights, including their right to education, health and civil participation, and their reproductive rights.

If these efforts are to succeed, this will demand addressing gender disparities between today’s boys and girls especially, but more specifically, addressing the vulnerabilities of the adolescent girl.

Beyond rhetoric

As we move toward the post-2015 development agenda, unleashing the potential and power of Africa’s youth should be a critical component of the continent’s developmental strategies, as reflected in the Addis Ababa Declaration on Population and Development – the regional outcome of ICPD beyond 2014 – and the Common African Position on the post-2015 development agenda.

This can no longer be reduced to election or political polemics. It requires urgent action.

Young people are central to the realisation of the demographic dividend. It is therefore important to protect and fulfil the rights of adolescents and youth to accurate information, comprehensive sexuality education, and health services for sexual and reproductive well-being and lifelong health, to ensure a productive and competitive labour force.

Africa cannot afford to squander the potential gains of the 21st Century offered by such an important demographic asset:  its youthful population.

Edited by Ronald Joshua

Excerpt:

A basket of condoms is passed around during International Women’s Day in Manila. Credit: Kara Santos/IPS

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 10 2014 (IPS)

As the United Nations continues negotiations on a new set of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for its post-2015 development agenda, population experts are hoping reproductive health will be given significant recognition in the final line-up of the goals later this year.

At the same time, an upcoming Special Session of the General Assembly in mid-September may further strengthen reproductive rights and the right to universal family planning."Advocates are rallying to ensure that SRHR remains as central to the next set of goals as it is to women's lives." -- Gina Sarfaty

Gina Sarfaty of the Washington-based Population Action International (PAI) told IPS, “We are at a critical juncture for sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR).”

As the conversation around the next set of SDGs begins to heat up, she said, “Advocates are rallying to ensure that SRHR remains as central to the next set of goals as it is to women’s lives.

“The stakes are high, and the need for action is paramount,” cautioned Sarfaty, a Geographic Information Systems (GIS) specialist and research associate at PAI.

World population, currently at over 7.2 billion, is projected to increase by 3.7 billion people by 2100. Much of this growth will occur in developing countries, with 64 percent concentrated in just 10 countries, according to PAI.

In eight of these nations – Nigeria, Tanzania, Democratic Republic of Congo, Niger, Uganda, Ethiopia, Kenya and Zambia – an important driver of population growth is persistently high fertility.

The remaining two countries accounting for the world’s increase – India and the United States – are those with already large populations and high net migration.

The ongoing negotiations for SDGs take place against the run-up to the upcoming special session of the General Assembly commemorating the 20th anniversary of the 1994 landmark International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo.

The special session, to be attended by several heads of state, is scheduled to take place Sep. 22 during the 69th session of the General Assembly.

Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin, under-secretary-general and executive director of the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA), told IPS the principles set at the ICPD in 1994 are as relevant today as they were 20 years ago.

“But we need to act strong and fast to realise the Cairo vision and achieve universal access to sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights, including family planning,” he added.

The special session presents the perfect opportunity for governments, at the highest level, to recommit to its success and to renew their political support for actions required to fully achieve the goals and objectives of its Programme of Action and achieve sustainable development, he said.

This will also place the Cairo principles firmly in the post-2015 development agenda, said Dr. Osotimehin, a former Nigerian minister of health.

Purnima Mane, president and chief executive officer of Pathfinder International, told IPS the September meeting represents an opportunity for world leaders to assess progress made over the past 20 years against the goals and strategies developed in 1994, identify any remaining gaps in performance that require increased attention and investment, and realign their efforts moving forward.

“This is a very important session for all of us working on sexual and reproductive health since it provides a critical forum for reaffirming and unifying international commitment to ICPD goals and for making an added push to do more on areas and in countries where we are lagging,” she said.

Asked why there wasn’t a follow-up international conference, perhaps an ICPD+20 on the lines of the Rio+20 environment conference in 2012, Mane said the Cairo Programme of Action developed a very forward-looking agenda and set the bar high for the international community 20 years ago.

She said its goals are still relevant and actionable, and the agenda is unfortunately not yet finished.

“My sense is that having a follow-up conference in such an environment was seen as neither strategic nor a good use of resources,” Mane said.

The upcoming special session “is intended to heighten focus on the goals established in the 1994 Programme of Action, stimulate discussion around what we will do to complete the unfinished agenda, re-engage on commitments already made and also push for more.

“I would hope the upcoming U.N. session will highlight the need to include sexual and reproductive health and rights upfront as a core component of the Sustainable Development Goals as the Open Working Group continues to develop its proposal,” said Mane, who oversees sexual and reproductive health programmes in more than 20 developing nations on an annual budget of over 100 million dollars.

Asked about the current status of world population growth, PAI’s Sarfaty told IPS that despite the fact that mortality has declined substantially, women in sub-Saharan Africa currently have more than five children on average, representing a modest decrease from the average of 6.5 children they had in the 1950s.

Compared to Latin America and Asia, she said, a slower pace of fertility decline has characterised sub-Saharan Africa, with stalls and even reversals along the way.

Of 22 countries where recent survey data is available, 10 are transitioning towards lower childbearing while 12 are currently experiencing fertility stalls.

“Therefore, the expectation that fertility will steadily decline in Africa, as the U.N. projects, will not hold without concerted policy and programme effort,” she warned.

The polar opposite fertility scenario is happening in the high income countries with low levels of fertility.

It is estimated that 48 percent of the world’s population lives in countries where women have fewer than 2.1 children on average in their lifetimes, she pointed out.

While fertility rates in these countries may be below replacement level, their need for family planning does not disappear, she declared.

Sarfaty said family planning use continued in Iran, for example, after the government discontinued its funding of family planning programmes in an attempt to encourage higher birth rates.

In addition to being ineffective, restricting access to family planning also restricts the right of a woman to determine her family size, she added.

Meanwhile, in a report released Thursday, the United Nations said the world’s population is increasingly urban, with more than half living in urban areas today and another 2.5 billion expected by 2050.

With nearly 38 million people, Tokyo tops U.N.’s ranking of most populous cities followed by Delhi, Shanghai, Mexico City, Sao Paulo and Mumbai.

The largest urban growth will take place in India, China and Nigeria: three countries accounting for 37 per cent of the projected growth of the world’s urban population between 2014 and 2050.

By 2050, India is projected to add 404 million urban dwellers, China 292 million and Nigeria 212 million.

Excerpt:

Girls attend school in South Africa. Healthy, educated young people can help break the cycle of poverty. Credit: UNFPA

By Adebayo Fayoyin
JOHANNESBURG, Jul 10 2014 (IPS)

An African proverb says “a child that we refuse to build today will end up selling the house that we may build tomorrow.”

The moral of this is clear. Unless we invest in our children and young people today, they might become a threat or a burden in the future.As the international community commemorates World Population Day on July 11, Africa’s growing youth population should be recognised as a ‘powerful force for change’ that requires greater investment today.

Judging by the current challenges confronting young people, the extent to which African countries are investing in the youth is unclear.

More young people

According to the Africa Regional Review for the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) the continent is experiencing substantial demographic shifts, which have seen about 21 million persons a year being added to the population since 1994.

Africa has the youngest population and will remain so for decades in a rapidly ageing world. By 2050 “the median age for Africa will increase to 25, while the average for the world as a whole will climb to about 38”.

The fertility rate on the continent is decreasing gradually and the new generation of young people will probably have fewer children than their parents. This demographic shift will also mean fewer elderly people and children to support than previous generations.

Undoubtedly, demography will greatly shape Africa’s position in the global markets for labour, trade and capital.

The phenomenon is what economists call a ‘demographic dividend’, which they argue is a one-time window of opportunity to create wealth and economic growth.

The future they want

But failure to invest in this demographic also comes with its own challenges.

Maternal mortality and HIV/AIDS are the two main causes of death among young women aged 15 to 24 years in sub-Saharan Africa.

Nearly everywhere, adolescents are inhibited from freely exercising their right to, for example, comprehensive sexuality education, contraceptives and sexual and reproductive health services.

Young men in South Sudan stand up for women’s rights. Credit: UNFPA

In many African counties, more than 40 per cent of young women aged 20 to 24 were married by age 18. Also in the countries with high child marriage rates – Niger, Mali, CAR, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Mauritania, Madagascar, Uganda, Senegal, Malawi, Cameroon and Libya – many girls are married off by age 15.

That is why investment in Africa’s youthful population from multiple angles, and primarily from the public and private sectors, is essential for realising the demographic dividend.

“Healthy, productive and fully engaged”

In his message for the World Population Day commemoration, UNFPA Executive Director Dr. Babatunde Osotimehim says “we know that healthy, educated, productive and fully engaged young people can help break the cycle of intergenerational poverty and are more resilient in the face of individual and societal challenges”

Africa’s largely youthful population makes up the next generation of workers, parents, and leaders and their challenges can no longer be ignored. Getting the best from the increased youth bulge in Africa can only be assured when appropriate health and development plans, policies and programmes are put in place and adequately implemented.

Adebayo Fayoyin is the Regional Communications Advisor for the UNFPA East and Southern Africa Regional Office.

Excerpt:

A Kopal gender sensitisation meeting in Uttarkashi district, India, ranked the fourth most dangerous country in the world for women. Credit: Nitin Jugran Bahuguna/IPS

By Jonathan Rozen
UNITED NATIONS, May 7 2014 (IPS)

As the U.N. focuses on refining its Post-2015 Development Agenda, divisions surrounding issues of population and development continue to plague consensus on a universal way forward.

“People have to be at the centre of development,” Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin, executive director of the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA), told IPS. “I think we are beginning to see a greater commitment [of governments] to deliver on gender parity, girls rights, issues of gender-based violence and girls education.”“I don’t think that many of these big problems are going to be resolved by exchanging documents and meeting at conferences. It’s going to be what we do on the ground." -- UN Women Executive Director Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka

Following the 2014 U.N. Commission on Population and Development (CPD), an annual gathering where member states, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and other members of civil society discuss and define goals on population and development, serious divisions emerged regarding issues of sexual health, sexual education and gender.

“The balance of this resolution remains heavily skewed towards peculiar interests of certain developed countries, as evidenced by undue emphasis on selected rights over the real development priorities,” said Fr. Justin Wylie, attaché for the Permanent Observer Mission of the Holy See to the U.N., on Apr. 12, following the adoption of the CPD outcome resolution.

“I refer in particular to the heavy focus on sexual or reproductive mores,” he said.

The sentiment that particular issues had a negative effect on the conduct of the conference was also expressed by member states with views in support of U.N. priorities.

“We were disappointed that certain contentious issues remained the focus of the conference at the expense of discussing more productive topics to improve the health of global populations,” Nicolas Doire, spokesperson for the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development (DFAIT), told IPS.

While UNFPA may not agree with the views of everyone at the CPD, the agency does understand the political nature of such conferences and the need for inclusive, plural dialogue in adopting the platform on population and development.

“The issue of sexuality, the issue of sexual reproductive health and [reproductive] rights evokes all kinds of things … apart from the politics,” Osotimehin told IPS. “We’ve always had conservatism around our issues.

“If we don’t bring people together in order to construct an action platform that brings all of the groups together, we are not likely to achieve the adoption,” he said.

For Dr. Osotimehin, a human rights-based agenda is essential because it was the foundation for the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo. That being said, he also recognises that over the last 20 years, the world has changed.

“Today there are more non-state actors and some of the countries are more vocal than they were before, so we are dealing with a new set of constituencies,” he said. “But if you don’t address rights … you are not going to make the kind of progress we want to see and match the investments.”

Many girls in rural areas of Pakistan say they dropped out of primary school either because there were no secondary schools in their villages, or because they were not within safe walking distance. Credit: Farooq Ahmed/IPS

Linking population and development

The U.N. Programme of Action of the ICPD Beyond report, released on Feb. 12, outlined the progress made on issues of population and development since the 1994 Cairo Conference.

A primary finding of the report was that where girls have the power make choices in their lives, from reproductive rights to education, they can add significantly to the economic capacity and development of their country.

That is why UNFPA has identified inequality as the primary impediment to developmental goals and defined the adolescent girl as the “face of development.”

“Imagine that you can give her the education she needs to protect her rights … ensure that she can access contraception when she needs to, ensure that she can get good quality jobs, ensure that she can marry when she wants to marry, ensure that she can participate politically. Then, you just changed the world,” Osotimehin told IPS.

This is not to say that ground level cultural needs are not recognised. It is important to engage in dialogue with communities, he said, in order to understand what they need, not only what their needs are believed to be.

Taking action

The U.N. has identified the imperative for direct action on population issues in addressing the associated developmental problems.

“I don’t think that many of these big problems are going to be resolved by exchanging documents and meeting at conferences. It’s going to be what we do on the ground,” Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, U.N. under-secretary-general and the executive director of U.N. Women, told IPS. “Activism, activism, activism.”

With this is mind, international conferences do provide legitimacy from which actors can work.

“It does help activists on the ground when something has been agreed to [in the conferences], because there is something to hang onto. So you also want those victories. But I think that we must not fool ourselves and think that [with a piece of paper], the problems have been solved,” Mlambo-Ngcuka said.

Beyond 2015

Looking to the ICPD conference in September, the key work ahead will be to reduce divisions and promote implementation.

“The fact that we have a document and that everybody has signed it does not mean that the problem has gone away. Those that feel they have lost will not necessarily implement what is there because it has been agreed to,” Mlambo-Ngcuka told IPS.

Moving the agenda’s focus away from controversial issues to incorporate the range of connections population issues have on development is one strategy UNFPA and other members of the international community are looking at.

“Integration should be big in the next development agenda,” Osotimehin told IPS. “We need to create linkages between one thing and the next … so were actually driving a development agenda.”

“We are focused on building consensus around initiatives that are proven to have the greatest impact,” said Doire.

The importance of a dynamic approaching to developmental challenges is central to the U.N. strategy as it works to build an agenda that includes contested subject matter.

“We need to bring all of the issues to bear when we talk about [population], so that it doesn’t get caught up in the old debates and questions,” Kathy Calvin, president and chief executive officer of the U.N. Foundation, told IPS. “It’s about your country’s economy [and] your country’s environment.”

Women march against the Dominican Republic's anti-abortion law in 2009. Credit: Elizabeth Eames Roebling/IPS

By Michelle Tullo
WASHINGTON, Mar 26 2014 (IPS)

Lawmakers and civil society leaders from over 30 countries are calling for universal access to safe, legal abortion.

The declaration, released in Washington on Wednesday, comes in the context of a 20-year review by the United Nations of the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo. That landmark conference called for safe access to abortions in countries where the procedure was legal, while Wednesday’s declaration calls for the decriminalisation of abortion in all countries.“What we know now is that law changes social attitudes.” -- Nepali MP Arzu Rana Deuba

The declaration also anticipates the post-2015 development agenda. Advocates are calling to expand the discussion on women’s health to include abortion rights when determining the next round of global development goals, following the expiration of the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs).

“True gender equality cannot be achieved without access to safe, legal abortion,” it says. “In the last two decades, roughly 1 million women and girls have died and more than 100 million have suffered injuries – many of them lifelong – due to complications from unsafe abortion.”

One of the MDGs, number five, does aim to reduce by three-quarters the maternal mortality ratio and to achieve universal access to reproductive health. However, it does not include access to safe abortions in its definition of access to reproductive health.

Advocates are now planning to formally offer these recommendations at a 20-year anniversary summit of the original ICPD. That event will take place in Addis Ababa next month.

“Looking ahead to ICPD+20 and the review of the Millennium Development Goals, the one goal they would not take was reproductive and sexual health for all,” Nafis Sadik, the special advisor to the executive director of UNAIDS and the former executive director of the United Nations Population Fund, told IPS.

The new declaration targets not just the international development agenda but also U.S. policymakers.

Four-decade-old legislation here has restricted foreign assistance programmes from funding abortion-related procedures. Critics say the result is a disconnect between the work done by USAID, the country’s main foreign assistance arm, and the women’s health services offered.

“Regarding the problem of U.S. policy – it’s not just the financial support, but the moral leadership,” Sadik says. “It makes a big difference if the U.S. becomes restrictive in areas of support, if they restrict funding for any NGO that provides abortion.”

Cost-effective and feasible

The Airlie Declaration was composed following a two-day conference near Washington. It was written by representatives from over 30 countries, including health ministers, members of parliament, and medical leaders as well as advocates from the United Nations lawmakers and civil society.

“Our goal is to bring this message forward and build a broader coalition,” Elizabeth Maguire, the president of Ipas, an international NGO dedicated to ending preventable deaths and disabilities from unsafe abortions, told IPS. “Every participant is committed to pursuing action.”

Maguire led the recent conference as convenor.

One such participant is John Paul Bagala, president of the Federation of African Medical Students’ Associations. Bagala works in a hospital in northern Uganda that treated 480 women from cases of unsafe abortions in 2011-12 and another 500 in 2012-13.

According to Bagala, providing access to safe abortion is cost-effective. Treating injuries resulting from an illegal abortion in Uganda can cost more than 100 dollars, he says, while the cost of a safe abortion would be less than 10 dollars.

“As a medical student in Africa, we are taking a stand to disseminate the declaration in our respective institutions,” Bagala told IPS.

“To drive [out] stigma from our health workers when they are still in the training system, to ensure that the women, when they come for service, get the best service they need in terms of safety and quality. We are driving towards integrating the aspects of this declaration in terms of reproductive health rights into the curriculum of training health workers in Africa.”

Ipas’s Maguire likewise emphasises that providing universal access to reproductive health care is not just critical but “feasible.” In the case of Nepal, for instance, decriminalising abortion greatly increased women’s health and maternal mortality ratio.

“Nepal is one of the few countries that will be meeting MDG 5, and what the experts say is that it’s increased access to family planning, emergency obstetric care, and increased access to emergency abortion care,” Arzu Rana Deuba, a member of the Nepali Parliament, told IPS.

Deuba recounted the story of a young girl in Nepal who was jailed for 12 years after she was raped and unsuccessfully attempted an illegal abortion. The girl’s story gained international attention, and Nepal eventually decriminalised abortion in 2002.

“It’s a story of hope,” said Deuba. “After 2004, we had 1,500 skilled providers and 75 hospitals doing medical abortion services. As of 2014, 500,000 women have access to safe abortions, and that’s quite a lot for we are not a big country.”

She says Nepal’s success comes not just in the growth of medical services but in the country’s changing cultural attitudes toward abortion.

“What we know now is that law changes social attitudes,” Deuba said.

“I work at the community level and workers tell me there is no more stigma, that abortion is seen as part of women’s rights, that women are more vocal about abortion … it’s seen as part of the continuum of care. Now women don’t have to die anymore and there is a feeling of confidence and security among women.”

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon (centre) arrives with Babatunde Osotimehin (left), Executive Director of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), for the opening of the 46th session of the Commission on Population and Development, Apr. 22-26, 2013. Credit: UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Mar 12 2014 (IPS)

When the United Nations hosts one of its mega conferences – whether on population, human rights, food security or sustainable development – there is always a demand for full and active participation of often-marginalised groups, including women, civil society, indigenous peoples and youth.

But some of the world’s parliamentarians – who help implement most of the U.N.’s programmes of action through national legislation – are also battling to find their rightful place at international conferences.

This is not a shortcoming of the United Nations, say legislators, but the fault of governments that refuse to acknowledge the importance of parliamentarians in official delegations.

When the annual U.N. Commission on Population and Development (CPD) takes place in New York next month, the Asian Forum of Parliamentarians on Population and Development (AFPPD) wants all governments in the Asia-Pacific region to include “at least one parliamentarian committed to progressive population and development policy in their country’s official delegation.”

John Hyde, deputy director of AFPPD, told IPS parliamentarians are directly elected and connected to their communities.

“They can see first-hand the benefit of rights-based, evidence-based policies in improving the life of their constituents,” he said.

And they bring this relevance and commitment to their nations’ delegations, he said.

The Programme of Action (PoA) adopted at the landmark 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) – which will be discussed at the CPD Apr. 7-11 – stressed the importance of parliamentarians, civil society and youth being involved in official delegations to the United Nations.

Confirming this, Purnima Mane, president and chief executive officer of Pathfinder International, told IPS “it is incredibly important we involve parliamentarians in development work, empowering them to appreciate and raise issues of population and development with their constituents, and gaining their support to champion global development in national policies, programmes, and budgets.”

In many countries, she pointed out, parliamentarians are already engaged in the process of monitoring their national progress on the ICPD PoA, and building political will and an enabling policy environment, and garnering needed resources for doing so.

Their example needs to be followed more vigorously around the world and inclusion of parliamentarians in national delegations is one way of recognising their role, said Mane, a former U.N. assistant secretary-general and deputy executive director of the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA).

Hyde told IPS over a third of the Asia-Pacific nations included members of parliaments (MPs) in their delegations to the sixth Asia and Pacific Population Conference held in the Thai capital of Bangkok last year.

The Pacific nations demonstrated the value of well-prepared, engaged MPs, with Cook Islands delegate leader, health minister and AFPPD member Nandi Glassie presenting the majority outcome position on behalf of all the Pacific and a solid majority of Asian nations.

Source: ICPD Beyond 2014 Global Report

While many nations will not reveal their full delegation until just before April, many parliamentarians who contributed to APPC should be in their nations’ delegations at the CPD in New York, “hopefully with other parliamentarians embedded in delegations from the other regions of the world”, he added.

Hyde said parliamentarians from across Asia and the Pacific gathered in Chiang Mai, Thailand last month to help craft the official oral statement on priority issues that AFPPD will present during the CPD in New York.

Asked whether the CPD will also focus on the successes and failures of ICPD, Mane told IPS, “While it is difficult to predict what particular issues will see the most attention at the Commission this year, we hope for a continued focus on human rights and individual dignity, the realisation of which is a driver for all areas of development.”

“At Pathfinder, we were encouraged by, and applaud, the focus on young people and women’s empowerment found in UNFPA’s most recent review, ‘ICPD Beyond 2014 Global Report’,” she added.

Mane said she is also encouraged to see the reference to sustainability.

Without the engagement of all, including women and young people, as well as realisation of their sexual and reproductive health and rights, sustainable development will be hard to achieve in its truest sense, she said.

The upcoming session will likely touch on the successes and failures of the achievements of the ICPD agenda in the context of identifying key lessons learned “that will carry us forward for greater success in the coming decades.”

These will clearly differ by countries but the major focus needs to be on what is going to be done going forward to accelerate the momentum towards progress, Mane said.

Given that the upcoming session will certainly be shaped by the context of this year and the international focus on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and what comes next, “I believe it is crucial the right to sexual and reproductive health for all people shines through as we discuss the path forward and the post-2015 global development agenda.”

She said progress has certainly been made and momentum is growing through ‘Every Woman Every Child’ and many other efforts by several bilateral partners like the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), national governments, philanthropic foundations, civil society and the private sector.

She said they are all working better through joint platforms, but many countries are still very much behind on equitable progress toward the MDG5 targets relating to the improvement of maternal health.

Sex education is expelled from Egyptian schools. Credit: Victoria Hazou/IPS

By Jonathan Rozen
UNITED NATIONS, Feb 14 2014 (IPS)

As the world moves closer to the 2015 end mark of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), a new U.N. report illuminates how far global society has come, but also how far it still must travel to achieve its objectives.

The report tracks the last two decades of progress on issues such as universal access to family planning, sexual and reproductive health services and reproductive rights, and equal access to education for girls."This report gives us the leverage to take things to the next level, where women, girls and young people will be central to the next development agenda.” -- Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin

“We must work with governments to address issues of inequality, which is I think the greatest determinate in terms of the MDGs,” Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin, executive director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), told IPS.

“We expect that as we move into the post-2015 conversation, the evidence we have today will ensure that member states will see that if they are going to make progress…we must put people at the centre of development.”

Since 1994, the year of the landmark International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo when 179 governments committed to a 20-year Programme of Action to deliver human rights-based development, UNFPA has identified significant achievements with regard to women’s rights and effective family planning, but also a dramatic increase in inequality.

Maternal mortality has dropped by almost 50 percent and more women than ever before have access to both contraception and family planning mechanisms, supporting a decrease in child mortality. Furthermore, women are increasingly accessing education, participating in the work force and engaged in the political process.

Nevertheless, a gross disparity remains between the developed and developing worlds. In a press conference, Dr.  Osotimehin indicated that while the global average likelihood of a woman dying in childbirth is one in 1,300, this increases to one in 39 when evaluating developing nations specifically.

The report also notes that 53 percent of the world’s income gains have gone to the top one percent of the global population, and that none of these gains have gone to the bottom 10 percent.

It focuses on root factors of these problems and the central influences on women and girls’ ability to make choices about their lives. Child marriage and education are two main factors in this respect.

Source: UNFPA

“It is important to underscore the fact that once girls don’t go to school, once they are married too early and once they have children as children, they cannot be equal to men, and they cannot have the same political and economic power as men,” explained Dr. Babatunde.

The effect of these factors is not limited to the success of the individual. They are also important for the development of nations as a whole.

“Education and access to health, if they are properly planned, allow people to live longer, and add value to the development of the country,” Dr. Osotimehin told IPS.

UNFPA does not work alone on these issues. Other organisations also collect information and cooperate to address problems associated with population and development.

“The report is very important for us because it both reflects what we have done and suggests a way forward that we like to think we have helped to inform,” Suzanne Petroni, senior director of gender, population and development at the International Centre for Research on Women (ICRW), an organisation which works to identify the contributions and barriers facing women across the world, told IPS.

In 2000, all U.N. member states at the time signed on to the MDGs, all of which are directly addressed in the second ICPD report. They are to be succeeded by the SDGs – the Sustainable Development Goals.

The 1994 Programme of Action was not limited to women’s rights. It also sought to address the individual, social and economic impact of urbanisation and migration, as well as support sustainable development and address environmental issues associated with population changes.

“Ensuring that we have a monitoring mechanism for the implementation of what governments have committed to…that is actually the most important thing going forward,” Dr. Osotimehin stressed to IPS. “We now need to make the commitments count on the ground.”

A key theme in the report is that in areas like South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, where 90 percent of the world’s youth are located, there is a massive opportunity for societies to capitalise on their resources and accelerate their development.

But governments must invest in their populations through education, healthcare, access to entrepreneurial opportunities and political participation.

“Civil society, the media, young people and women’s groups can actually work to, in a very positive way, see what [governments] are doing right, and point out where things are not going well…we are seeing that happen around the world,” said Dr. Osotimehin.

“This report gives us the leverage to take things to the next level, where women, girls and young people will be central to the next development agenda.”

Last week, I had the privilege of attending the Delhi Sustainable Development Summit, an annual event that deals with a subject that is very close to my heart.  The summit gathered together amazing people: Nobel Prize winners, thought leaders, heads of state, corporate innovators, and academicians to deal with the paramount challenges of the 21st Century all focused on three pressing dimensions of sustainability:  food, water and energy.

Credit: Todd France Photography, 2012

Clearly these are critical to the future of humanity. Right now, about one in eight of the human beings with whom we share this planet lives without adequate drinking water. Almost that many lack food security.  And nearly one in five people manage without the additional power and options that electricity affords.

How to meet current needs, without compromising the prospects of generations who will follow, is a very complicated issue.

It was encouraging to see so many  brilliant and committed scientists, economists and development specialists working so hard on the innovations and ideas that can help us produce, distribute and use precious resources more efficiently and equitably.

Their work is essential because it will take all of us working with our unique capacities to solve the really difficult challenges ahead.

But from my perspective, it is also critically important to empower the very people who grapple with these issues every day: the girls who dream of a better future as they carry water over long distances, the women who toil over inefficient and polluting cookstoves, and the small farmers who manage to produce 70 percent of the world’s food far more sustainably than larger concerns.

We need to stay focused on solutions that keep these people at the forefront of our decision-making —  because it is their individual choices that will ultimately have a pivotal role in how our common future unfolds. When individual rights are fully respected, and when people are placed at the center of development, solutions have an inherent sustainability.

Something learned from my own country and our Nordic sisters is that healthy and productive societies generate a self-sustaining circle of greater well-being and productivity. Inequality and the exclusion of women, young people, and the poor, in contrast, undermine health, wellbeing and economic growth.

Although we need everyone’s contributions to solve the global problems we face, the full talents and capabilities of women remain untapped in many countries.  It’s not that women aren’t working hard. Indeed, they are working overtime as food producers, preparers, sellers and consumers, as mothers and nurturers, as water bearers and as custodians of family hygiene.

And this is often without the benefit of time-efficient technologies and energy services – or modern forms of contraception, for that matter. This means that women are often overburdened in terms of reproduction as well as production.

The sad fact is that women work more hours than men and produce half of the world’s food. Yet they earn only a fraction of the world’s income and own a small share of the world’s property.

Women are managing to ensure food for so many. Therefore they need proper  training, equipment and rights to land.  They need to be able to participate in the economy and they most definitely need access to sexual and reproductive health services, as related health issues disproportionately affect women – from complications of pregnancy and childbearing to the HIV epidemic.

Gender-based violence takes another huge toll. What if the full potential and power of women were unleashed?  Imagine what they could accomplish.

We need to invest in the empowerment of women to achieve the kind of transformations that can sustain economic growth, preserve the environment, foster resilience and leave no one behind. And we need to invest in sexual and reproductive rights for all, including for the next generations, if we are to achieve truly sustainable development.

Women are keenly attuned to the requirements of sustainability. When they have control and freedoms over their own sexual and reproductive lives, women tend to choose healthier and smaller families that can be more resilient to crises, displacement or environmental challenges, and can relieve local population pressures on limited resources and fragile ecosystems.

That’s why it’s critically important that the next framework for international development – the global agenda that will replace the Millennium Development Goals after 2015 – deals squarely with gender equality and sexual and reproductive rights for all.  These issues go right to the heart of sustainability.  I remain committed to making sure they are not overlooked.

Tarja Halonen, the former President of Finland, co-chairs the High-Level Task Force for ICPD (International Conference on Population and Development). She has also served in numerous capacities in international forums, including as co-chair of both the Millennium Summit and the UN Secretary-General’s High-level Panel on Global Sustainability.

By Diana Cariboni
MONTEVIDEO, Aug 14 2013 (IPS)

Latin America and the Caribbean should play a central role in the construction of “sexual citizenship” – a concept that covers a series of population-related issues, rights and guarantees that this region helped build since the United Nations first emerged, says Brazilian expert Carmen Barroso.

Latin America has long been in the vanguard in the promotion of women’s rights, and still is today, Barroso, Western Hemisphere regional director for the International Planned Parenthood Federation, tells IPS in this interview.

Carmen Barroso doesn’t expect setbacks at the Montevideo conference. Credit: Courtesy of IPPF

Barroso, who was a key player in the negotiations for the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo, says all innovations and creative solutions in this area come from civil society, where youth movements particularly stand out today.

For that reason she does not believe there will be any backsliding at the first session of the Regional Conference on Population and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean, running Aug. 12-15 in Montevideo, the Uruguayan capital.

In this week’s meeting, the region is assessing its progress and failures and hammering out a common position to take to the U.N. General Assembly.

Q: Do you expect setbacks in this first regional conference?

A: No, I don’t. The region has made great strides since the 1990s. Governments are aware that this is a development issue. There is no one here who wants to move backwards.

Furthermore, there are at least 12 government delegations here that have incorporated civil society – which sends a message that governments want to feel they represent different voices in their countries.

Civil society is essential; it gave rise to the rights agenda. Governments don’t have time to create things in that terrain. When they act in a creative manner, it is due to the influence of civil society.

I also think there will be a global impact. This region has always been in the vanguard. It was an extremely central actor in promoting women’s rights in the process of the United Nations charter and in the creation (in 1946) of the Commission on the Status of Women. That was a long time ago."There is still this terribly daft idea that sex education encourages 'sin'." -- Carmen Barroso

Now, the region is changing; there are many middle-income countries and Brazil is part of the BRICS group (along with Russia, India, China and South Africa). That means the world looks at us differently.

Q: What issues could stand in the way of a consensus?

A: The danger I see is that references to abortion could stay the same as they are in the Cairo Programme of Action: that it’s a public health problem; that when it is permitted it must be safe; and that it is necessary to act in line with national laws.

This will be a major focus of debate. The reality in the region has changed. Uruguay decriminalised abortion, the Mexican capital did so as well, and so did Guyana and Puerto Rico. Colombia adopted more flexible rules, and Brazil expanded the circumstances in which abortion is legal. In Cuba abortion has been legal since the 1960s.

It’s important for this to be reflected in the regional position, but that won’t be easy.

Another aspect is the demand for comprehensive sex education, particularly for young people. There is still this terribly daft idea that sex education encourages “sin”, or earlier sexual initiation.

The research shows that this isn’t true, and that the start of sexual activity is even sometimes delayed, because girls and young women are empowered and feel they can say no if they aren’t really sure.

There is also talk of explicitly including the right to gender identity and respect for sexual diversity.

But sexual and reproductive rights are broader. Women also have the right to not be harassed in the street or in their workplace. Many of these aspects have been forgotten.

To sum up, we are creating what we could call “sexual citizenship” – and comprehensive sex education is essential for that.

Q: How have the civil society groups that have formed part of this process in the last two decades evolved?

A: The most important thing is to look at young people. We have numerous delegations of very active young people here who also express and organise themselves as such. When I got involved in these issues I was young, of course, but I didn’t define myself as such. What defined me was being a feminist and a woman. This is new.

Q: Now that we’re talking about young people: one problem where there have been setbacks rather than progress is teenage pregnancy.

A: It’s true. A study by ECLAC (Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean) shows that, in half of the countries where statistics are available, the figures have remained the same, and in the other half, they have gone up.

There are some new developments, however: many adolescent girls who have a first child don’t have a second child (in adolescence), which is what used to happen.

Q: What explains this?

A: That they only have access to birth control methods and information once they enter the health system because of the pregnancy and birth.

Q: It would seem that adolescents today enjoy greater sexual freedom than 20 years ago, but don’t have the tools to handle it…

A: Not all of them. There are class-based differences. In the wealthiest quintile of the population, there are no teen pregnancies, which are concentrated in the poorest quintile.

Q: What’s the solution?

A: Governments should start out by living up to their promises. In 2008, the region’s education and health ministers pledged to ensure comprehensive sex education mechanisms in schools. What we have seen so far are a few timid steps in a handful of countries.

Excerpt:

Ahmad Alhendawi, the U.N. secretary general's special envoy on youth, speaks with participants in the programme Jóvenes en Red (Youth Net) from Manga, a working-class neighbourhood on the outskirts of Montevideo. Credit: David Puig/UNFPA

By Raúl Pierri
MONTEVIDEO, Aug 13 2013 (IPS)

Shortcomings in the educational system in Latin America and the Caribbean fuel inequalities that remain hurdles to access to the labour market and safe sex for a large part of the region’s youth.

Around half of the region’s sexually active youngsters have never used any form of birth control, and an estimated 20 percent of children in the region were born to mothers between the ages of 10 and 19.

The HIV/AIDS rate, meanwhile, has declined but remains high: some 250,000 Latin Americans aged 15 to 24 are living with HIV.

These statistics were reported at the first session of the Regional Conference on Population and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean, running Aug. 12-15 in Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay.

Marcela Suazo, regional director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), said the problem is that “there is insufficient access to sex education in the region.

“Sex education is still missing from the basic national curriculum in many public schools, although some private schools are providing knowledge and information,” she told IPS.

Suazo said that as medical care continues to advance, education and information on sexual and reproductive rights remain limited, which makes it difficult for young people to receive adequate attention.

The UNFPA official took part in a forum Monday to mark World Youth Day – observed Aug. 12 – ahead of the regional gathering.

This week’s meeting, which is assessing the progress made in implementing the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) held in Cairo in 1994, is organised by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) and the Uruguayan government, with support from UNFPA.

Suazo also said sex education continues to face prejudices.

“Adults behave differently with people who we consider young and less prepared, who are thus treated in a prejudiced manner,” she said.

But even when good sexual and reproductive services exist, many young women do not use them because they fear they will be judged because of their sexual behaviour, she said.

“We need to overcome this barrier because it’s directly related to teen pregnancy, to the reproduction of poverty and inequality, which is a pending challenge for Latin America and the Caribbean,” she stressed.

Limitations on the sexual and reproductive rights of young women in Latin America directly influence their chances of completing their studies and avoiding poverty.

In this region, between 15 and 40 percent of young women say their first sexual experience was forced, while nearly 30 percent of adolescent girls are married before the age of 18.

The U.N. secretary general’s special envoy on youth, Ahmad Alhendawi, also stressed the importance of sexual education.

“We believe it’s fundamental for young people to know more about their bodies,” he told IPS. “Every six minutes a young person is affected with HIV/AIDS and this is unacceptable. These are dangerous numbers. We believe by providing tools and information we’ll be able to tackle this issue.”

According to figures from the ICPD high-level task force, the region is experiencing the largest youth cohort in history: Of the 600 million people in Latin America and the Caribbean, more than 26 percent are aged 15 to 29 – a demographic boom that should be harnessed, experts say.

But youth unemployment is the expression of a gap between education and the labour market.

“The education system is not equipping young people with the skills and the knowledge that they need to enter the labour market. This mismatch is daunting and shrinking young people’s chances to get decent job opportunities,” Alhendawi said.

“Globally, 73.4 million young people are unemployed, and this is a number that requires all of us to respond quickly to this problem,” he added.

Alhendawi underlined the importance of increasing investment in this age group, and called on governments and private institutions to provide financial services to enable young people to set up their own businesses, so that they can stop being job-seekers and become innovators and job-creators instead.

In Latin America and the Caribbean, only 10 percent of young people work in the formal economy, Suazo noted.

Young people “are the first to lose their jobs when there are cutbacks,” she said. “And when they want to get a formal sector job, they face requisites, like five years of experience, when they are just coming out of the university.”

Besides, she added, “we are facing a new industrial-technological revolution. Education systems should be reviewed so that they allow the development of the necessary skills, capacities and knowledge for young people to take part in this innovation.”

The UNPFA official acknowledged that education has improved in certain respects in Latin America. For example, 95 percent primary school enrolment has been achieved.

“But when we look at the secondary and university levels, the numbers start to come down considerably,” she said.

“Primary education does not manage to develop the necessary competence and skills for people to take part in development processes in productive areas,” she said.

The secretary general of the Ibero-American Youth Organisation (OIJ), Alejo Ramírez, urged governments to put a priority on youth when it comes to spending.

“The economic growth seen in Latin America in recent years has helped develop many sectors. But the youth, who are hardest hit by unemployment and inequality, are the last to be reached by public spending,” he lamented.

Only an estimated 20 percent of social spending benefits people under the age of 30, he said.

The OIJ also presented the First Ibero-American Youth Survey. Ramírez told IPS that the study’s main finding was that two out of three young people believe that in five years they will be better off, “pointing to a strong degree of optimism.”

When the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) participates in a regional review conference in the Uruguayan capital of Montevideo next week, it will take stock of the successes and failures of a wide range of gender-related issues, including reproductive health, sexual violence, women’s rights, maternal mortality, and the spread of HIV/AIDS – all of them relating to Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC).

A young pregnant Argentine woman contemplates the risks and difficulties of pregnancy and motherhood. Credit: Carolina Camps/IPS

And the question lingering in the minds of most delegates will be how LAC has fared in implementing the landmark Programme of Action (PoA) adopted at the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo.

The question appears even more relevant considering the fact that a high-level meeting of the General Assembly is due to take place in 2014 to review ICPD achievements – and shortcomings – over the last 20 years.

Maria Jose Alcala, director of the Secretariat of the High-Level Task Force for ICPD, insists the international community must build on the Cairo commitments.

She told IPS that Cairo was a landmark, placing the reproductive rights of women at the centre of sustainable development.

“Their implementation has brought tremendous benefits to individuals, families, economies and countries, though they remain unfulfilled for millions across the region,” Alcala said.

But at the Montevideo Conference, scheduled to take place Aug. 12-15 and organised by the U.N. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), “We must also go beyond agreements made 20 years ago to make the promise of Cairo, and the sexual and reproductive rights for all, a reality regardless of who you are or where you come from,” she noted.

Speaking at the 30th anniversary of the UNFPA Population Awards ceremony last week, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon underlined the fact that “population is not a matter of numbers”.

“It is all about people – the choices they make and the choices they are able to make,” he said. “We must empower individuals. We must protect their freedom, ability and right to make informed decisions. This will enable people to fulfil their potential. And that will advance whole societies.”

UNFPA Executive Director Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin concurs with Ban’s view that development is not sustainable unless it is equitable and serves all people.

“I couldn’t agree with him more. We at UNFPA continue to emphasise that people and the principle of equity must be kept at the centre of sustainable development,” he said.

Dr. Osotimehin says it means recognising the need to invest in women and young people and promoting human rights. “It means increasing equity to build a world of opportunity for all.”

Alcala said that among the issues to be discussed at Montevideo, a high priority would be fundamental human rights.

“Governments in the region need to make strong commitments to advance gender equality, the rights of women and girls, the empowerment of young people, and sexual and reproductive health and rights,” she said.

These are basic rights to make decisions about one’s own private life and free of any form of discrimination, coercion or violence.

“They include deciding if, when and how many children to have, if and whom to marry, decisions about one’s body, sexuality and health and to have the information and services to do so,” she noted.

But for too many women and adolescent girls in the LAC region – and for too many young people and communities living in poverty – enjoyment of these rights is still far from reality, she warned.

As the United Nations embarks on its post-2015 development agenda, described as a logical successor to its Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) with a 2015 deadline, population and reproductive health are expected to be an integral part of the new agenda, including the proposed Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The Montevideo conference will include a general discussion on national experiences relating to population and development, prospects for the period beyond 2014, and the role of adolescents and youth.

Alcala told IPS a key issue is bringing more policy attention and investments to adolescents and youth.

She pointed out adolescent girls in Latin America and the Caribbean, have the second highest pregnancy rates in the world after sub-Saharan Africa. About 20 percent of all births in the region are to adolescent mothers between 10 and 19 years of age.

And young women in the Caribbean are 2.5 times more likely to be infected with HIV than young men, she added.

She said her task force is calling for universal access to comprehensive sexuality education for all young people, in and out of school.

Countries in the region are already taking concrete steps in this direction: this must be a priority of any common-sense 21st century education agenda, Alcala said.

She said more needs to be done to intensify prevention of violence against women and girls and bring perpetrators to justice. Some 36 percent of women in the LAC region have experienced sexual or physical violence in their lifetime and, despite increased efforts in various countries, impunity for these crimes remains rampant.

Alcala said governments meeting in Montevideo must also address ending unsafe abortion as a major killer of women and adolescent girls. Latin America and the Caribbean has the highest rate of unsafe abortions in the world: 4.2 million unsafe abortions every year.

Beyond ensuring every woman and adolescent girl has access to sexual and reproductive health information and modern contraception – including emergency contraception – this includes expanding access to safe abortion, which is one of the safest medical procedures available.

“We must put a stop to the fear unleashed upon women, and the cruel imprisonment and punishment of women and girls who have sought life-saving care after undergoing an unsafe abortion,” Alcala said.

“We must remember that even where it is illegal, in the region as across the world, wealthy women and couples will find a way to obtain a safe procedure; but it is poor women and girls who will be forced to risk their lives when they are left with no other recourse but an unsafe abortion.”

This issue is a fundamental matter of social equity, she said, adding that the need for abortion will not go away.

“So we have a choice: to continue standing on the sidelines as women and girls risk and lose their lives, or allow women and adolescent girls the basic right to make decisions about their own bodies, health and lives,” she said.

LGBT activists, human rights observers and police officers wait outside a courtroom in Uganda's constitutional court. Four activists had brought a case against Minister of State for Ethics and Integrity Simon Lokodo. Credit: Will Boase/IPS

By George Gao
UNITED NATIONS, Apr 26 2013 (IPS)

Ishita Chaudhry spent the past 36 hours listening to U.N. delegates discuss population growth and development. She noticed that on “controversial” topics, such as sexual and reproductive rights, young people’s voices often get lost.

“For us as young people, it’s really not as controversial as it is for governments,” said Chaudhry, a member of the High-Level Task Force for the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), at a press briefing Thursday.

“We know that we need to be empowered to claim our human rights… And we understand that access to sexual, reproductive health and birth services, and comprehensive sexuality education is a key aspect of that empowerment,” she explained.

Joaquim Alberto Chissano, a former president of Mozambique and co-chair of the task force, added, “Fulfilling sexual and (reproductive) health and rights is not only a human right… it also offers solutions to many of today’s global problems.”

Chissano – often credited for ending civil war and strengthening democracy in Mozambique – cited the links between sexual and reproductive health and national progress.

He explained that by promoting sexual and reproductive health, the international community can “fully unleash human potential, energies and talents… to nurture the human capital that countries need to reduce poverty and inequality”.

If sexual and reproductive rights are not addressed, “those who will feel the pinch more are the coming generations”, he warned.

The task force’s work – entitled “Policy Recommendations for the ICPD Beyond 2014: Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights for All” – reaffirms values established almost twenty years ago in Cairo, where 179 governments gathered to adopt a Programme of Action that placed the human rights of women at the centre of international development goals.

The task force calls on the governments to address Cairo’s “unfinished agenda” by: ensuring sexual and reproductive rights through law; working towards universal access to sexual and reproductive health services; providing sexuality education for all young people; and eliminating violence against women and girls.

It argues that governments should expand access to safe abortion and to services for victims of gender-based violence, and that the international community should adopt a definition of “comprehensive sexuality education”.

The task force’s work will inform U.N. negotiations for a new development framework, to replace the expiring Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) post-2015.

According to the task force, the sexual and reproductive health of young women and girls are particularly compromised. It cites that one in three girls in developing countries are married without their consent; 2,400 young people are infected with HIV every day; and up to 50 percent of all sexual assaults are committed against girls under the age of 16.

Asked if sexual and reproductive rights are often barred by social or cultural norms, Chaudhry – founder of The YP Foundation, a non-profit organisation in India – said, “I come from a country that has a broad representation, both in terms of religion (and) culture. It has a lot of sensitivities.”

She emphasised the importance of providing information and sexuality education to approach such sensitivities. “You’re not telling the young person that they should or shouldn’t do something, you’re giving them access to evidence-based information, which means that they are in the best place to decide (for themselves).”

She said, “Because there’s such a broad lack of understanding… the fear and stigma and discrimination around issues of sex and sexuality therefore remains very high.”

Chaudhry argued that some of the most effective cases in achieving sexual and reproductive rights are when governments invest at community levels in reducing levels of related stigma.

She explained, “One of the biggest misconceptions of sexuality education is that if you provide sexuality education to an adolescent, you’re going to decrease the age of first sex.”

She added, “Once you start breaking the stigma and the silence around issues of sex and sexuality, you find that even parents and religious leaders themselves have questions… They (just) haven’t had anybody else to ask.”

Tarja Halonen, former president of Finland and co-chair of the task force, posed a question of her own: would you want to perpetuate socially rooted injustices, “or would you like to be the founding father or mother with a new way of (doing things)”?

She explained that while it is important to respect traditional values, it is also important to abide by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. She emphasised the need to work with experts from schools, health centres and religious communities.

Halonen noted that social stigmas on sexuality are prevalent even in Finland – ranked the second happiest country by the U.N.’s World Happiness Report. These stigmas discourage victims of sexual abuse from seeking the help they need, while providing impunity for perpetrators.

Halonen told IPS, however, that there has been some progress. She shared her experience fighting for sexual and reproductive rights, which started over four decades ago when she was a young lawyer.

“In the late 1960s, when I spoke on behalf of young Finnish students… I said that (students) need more information for these issues,” said Halonen.

“I remembered how they answered me in Parliament. They said, ‘(Students) are in the university in order to study, not to have sex’.”

Despite social stigmas and Parliament’s neglect, Halonen was able organise sexual and reproductive health services and information for the university’s health care centres.

Her national progress for sexual and reproductive rights continued from there.

“We changed the legislation in 1970s concerning minorities (and) homosexuals. Then we changed the abortion law, little by little. Now when we look at statistics, we see afterwards that it has worked well. We have less abortions, we have better birth rates, we have fewer HIVs,” she said.

“So what are we afraid of?” she added.

Women's sexual and reproductive rights are at the heart of sustainable development, experts say. Credit: Fahim Siddiqi/IPS

By Becky Bergdahl
UNITED NATIONS, Oct 2 2012 (IPS)

Gathered at the Ford Foundation in New York Monday, international luminaries, family planning experts and women’s rights activists repeatedly expressed a common sentiment: “I cannot believe that we are still having this discussion today.”

They were there to mark the launch of a new 26-member high-level task force to galvanise support behind the goals of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD).

That conference took place nearly two decades ago, in Cairo, Egypt in 1994. It resulted in a Programme of Action that become the guiding document for the United Nations Population Fund, UNFPA.

The Programme of Action contains four global goals. First, universal access to education for all, including women and girls. Second, reduction of infant and child mortality. Third, reduction of maternal mortality. And fourth, access to reproductive and sexual health services, including family planning.

The ICPD goals will celebrate their 20th anniversary in 2014. None have been reached so far, especially the last.

“I would not say that the goals have not been fulfilled, but that they have only been partially fulfilled. There are a number of reasons for this,” Gita Sen told IPS.

Sen is a professor of public policy at the Indian Institute of Management in Bangalore, and has worked on population policies for 35 years. She is a member of the new task force, and attended the conference in Cairo in 1994.

“One thing that has definitely happened in those 18 years is that there is a language of sexual and reproductive rights, which was never there before,” Sen said.

“A part of what we are seeing is that this language has scared some people in governments, some very religious people, some social conservatives, who see this as a zero-sum game,” she said.

“They think that if women are empowered, if young people get autonomy and choice, they are going to lose out in terms of their ability to control them. Which is probably true, to some extent. But in the end it is for a better life for everybody.”

According to Sen, the rise of conservatism, hindering achievement of the ICPD goals, has its roots in the United States.

“For example, the spread of evangelical conservatism in Africa is funded heavily from this country. It is funded by very rich people who are pouring their millions into very poor countries, in order to ensure that they turn their agenda away from sexual and reproductive rights, against gender equality. And with that much money pouring in it is hardly surprising that we have faced so much trouble as we do.”

Yet Sen maintains a positive attitude. “We are going to win this one. You can not keep young people and women back forever. This is not the dark ages,” she concluded.

Much remains to be done. A staggering 200 million women worldwide still lack access to effective contraception. This results in 80 million unintended pregnancies each year, with 40 million ending in unsafe abortions, many with life-threatening consequences.

And 800 women who carry out their pregnancies, wanted or unwanted, die every day in childbirth – 99 percent of them in developing countries.

“We know that our response has been inadequate,” Ishita Chaudhry, a member of the new task force and the leader of the youth organisation TYPF in India, working for sexual and reproductive rights, said at the event.

Chaudhry highlighted the importance of banning child marriage in order to achieve the ICPD goals.

Child brides, girls married before their 18th birthday, run especially high risks of unwanted pregnancy and also of abuse. And there are currently over 60 million child brides worldwide.

Chaudhry told the audience about how she grew up in a middle-class family in India, with her mother working as a teacher in the slums. When Chaudhry befriended some of her mother’s students, she was shocked to learn that the most common topic of discussion was if the girl’s parents were planning to marry them off.

“I lost some of my closest friends… They got married and their husbands wanted them to stay home to cook and clean and have babies,” Chaudhry said.

On top of that, marital rape was not considered a crime in India at the time, and it is still legal in a great number of states.

“How do you say no when your government do not recognise your right to do it?” Chaudhry asked.

One in seven women experience domestic or sexual violence in their lifetime. Up to one in four women experience abuse during pregnancy. This has ravaging consequences for the women and for their babies, and for the society as a whole.

“Women’s sexual and reproductive rights are at the heart of sustainable development,” said Tarja Halonen, a former president of Finland and co-chair of the new high-level task force.

“Pregnancy should be one of the happiest times in our life… Girls pay the price of taboos and double standards,” she said.

Crown Princess Mary of Denmark also appeared at the launch of the new task force, of which she is a member.

“We are here today because… the Cairo agenda is an unfinished agenda,” Princess Mary said.

A famous feminist slogan is that the personal is political. And Princess Mary did go on to talk about day-to-day life in the Danish royal family.

“My oldest son is soon that age when he will start to ask how babies are made. He will receive answers from us, and education in school… With knowledge comes the opportunity to make informed decisions,” she said.

According to Princess Mary, talking about sex may very well be uncomfortable. “But not talking about these issues might have a much higher price.”