Does equality empower? (World Population Day special)

July 11, 2005
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By Kamala Sarup

Kamala Sarup
(File photo)

Every year on July 11, we celebrate World Population Day by organizing special events. The theme of this year’s World Population Day is “Equality Empowers.” The world has been observing World Population Day since July 11, 1987.

On the occasion of the World Population day, executive director of UNFPA (United Nations Population Fund) Thoraya Ahmed Obaid said, “Equality is a goal that demands sustained political commitment and leadership. They include a higher quality of life for individual woman and girls, and stronger families, communities and countries.”

Today, poor sexual and reproductive health is a leading cause of death and illness for women in the developing world. No other area of health reflects the large inequities between rich and poor, both among and within countries. Poverty and inequality also fuel the acceleration of HIV infection, because women lack power to negotiate their personal safety. Another cost is the continuation of harmful practices that place the lives of women and girls in danger. The costs include high rates of maternal death and disability because women’s health is not made a political priority, she added.

For tens of millions of girls, child marriage and early childbearing mean an incomplete education, limited opportunities and serious health risks. But perhaps the highest cost of gender discrimination is widespread violence against women and girls, which remains one of the most pervasive and shameful human rights violations, compromising the personal security, liberty, dignity and well-being of millions of women and children worldwide.

Equality means where girls and women have equal opportunity to education, equal access to income, and assets to control their own fertility. In such a condition, both men and women are able to participate equally and exercise their full human rights.

Executive director of UNFPA Thoraya Ahmed Obaid

Executive director of UNFPA Thoraya Ahmed Obaid
(Photo source:unfpa.org)

Thousands of mothers around the world find themselves caught between life and death. Every day thousands of mothers die of malnutrition, thousands of women still can not choose when or whether to become pregnant. Thousands of women are subject to derogatory treatment including sexual violence.

Studies show that the present trend of the population growth has outgrown the development in the economical and food production sector especially in developing countries. If this trend continues, most of the South Asian countries including Nepal will be ravaged by famine and economic crisis.

More and more women are not in favor of having many children, but these women do not have easy access to various types of family planning facilities. In Nepal, only 39 percent of the married couple have access to means of family planning. The `unmet need,’ according to the Family Planning Association of Nepal (FPAN), is at least 28 percent.

There is no reproductive freedom for the majority of women in our country. They have to bear children one after the other until her husband is satisfied. A son is a must. Most of the women’s deaths in the developing countries could be prevented by using existing medical knowledge, but there are many reasons why mothers continue to die. There are cultural and social causes that increase the risk of women’s death during pregnancy.

Women all over the world want and need information on sexuality and sexual health, and access to appropriate information and services to help them make right decisions. The issue becomes more importance since half the world’s population is under the age of 25 and half of all new HIV infections occur to young women.

Vice-chairman of the Council of Ministers Kirtinidhi Bista (second from left) in the inaugural ceremony of ?World Population Day 2005? in Kathmandu, Monday, July 11 05. nepalnews.com/rh

At the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), 180 nations recognized the importance of improving access to health care, education and employment opportunities to improve women’s development. Even the right to family planning was more specifically defined in the 1979 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women.

The Cairo Programme of Action (United Nations, 1994) says, “Reproductive health implies that people are able to have a satisfying and safe sex life and that they have the capability to reproduce and the freedom to decide if, when and how often to do so. Implicit in this are the rights of men and women to be informed and to have access to safe, effective, affordable and acceptable methods of family planning of their choice” (paragraphs 7.2 and 7.3).

Reproductive right was not discussed when the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was drawn up. However, it has become a recognized basic human right, which has had a major impact on the advancement of women’s status and their lives during the past century.

The world population has already crossed the 6 billion mark and the two Asian giants, India and China, alone have over 2 billion people.

Decentralisation is key to good local governance. Population planning should, therefore, be an integral part of local development initiatives. Launching of literacy campaigns together with awareness programmes could serve as the conduit towards addressing the issue of equality and growing population.

Equal opportunities for both sexes in the field of education and employment is very important. Only by challenging the ingrained and systemic roots of women’s inequality would true equality with men can be realized.