ALOK31
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KARACHI:
World Population Day has been celebrated every year on July 11 for over two decades, with a pledge to reduce the rapidly growing population.
Today, the event is being celebrated by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) with big fanfare and a summit in London.
Pakistan is confronted with one of the highest population growth rates in Asia, with the exception of Afghanistan. Our planners have yet to realise that widespread poverty in the country, deteriorating civic amenities, poor health conditions, increasing crimes in cities, pollution or water shortages for farming as well as for household consumption, all have their roots in rapid population growth.
Can Pakistan overcome its multiple problems, where the average number of children born per woman exceeds five in rural areas and the urban slums?
The comparative rates per woman is 1.9 in Iran, two in Turkey, 2.2 in Indonesia and 2.5 in Bangladesh, which all had similar fertility levels in the 1970s.
Rapid population growth in Pakistan
Pakistans population growth rate is one of the highest among most Muslim-majority countries largely due to our governments policy, till the mid-90s, of not having an aggressive family planning programme.
According to the 1998 census, Pakistans population growth rate during the decade was about 2.6% per annum. Since then, the rate has declined; however still, with a 2% growth rate per annum, Pakistans population in the next 20 years will exceed that of Indonesia, making it the largest Muslim country in the world.
Family planning
In Pakistan, modern methods of contraceptives are only being used by about 22% of married women, which compares with about 55% in Bangladesh and Indonesia and over 70% in Iran.
Very few people are aware that exactly 50 years ago, Pakistan was the second country in the world that launched an official family planning programme, with an encouraging first few years. However, later, its name was changed to Population Welfare Programme and was put into the hands of bureaucracy, ignoring the professionals.
With the charge of planning and executing the programme handed over to provinces, it is high time we not only make a pledge to reduce the high population growth rate but do something more aggressive to reduce the high fertility rate of women.
How to meet the challenge?
The immediate task ahead is to decrease the population growth rate to 1% by reducing the average number of children per woman to about two, within the next five years, as was done by Iran.
It is no more a question of motivating couples to have fewer children, as studies have shown that over 30% of women want to use family planning methods but are unable to do so due to lack of facilities.
If one adds those who are using modern methods of contraceptives (22% of married women) and those who want to use them, a contraceptive use rate of over 50% could be easily achieved.
Strategies
At the government level, provinces should make and implement their own policy. Secondly, population planning is a subject, where all the stakeholders should be involved in formulating a sound policy as well as in its execution. In this respect, the role of the Department of Health is the most crucial.
Each Basic Health Unit, Rural Health Centre as well as district hospitals should be fully equipped to provide family planning and reproductive health services.
A mechanism needs to be developed, whereby various stakeholders can work under one umbrella, to promote family planning activities, provide services and monitor the programmes activities.
This could be achieved by establishing a Foundation for Population Activities (FPA), which should be modeled along the lines of non-profit organisations. It could be headed by a professional who would be guided by a governing body consisting of key professionals from the population and reproductive health fields, public figures and representatives of civil society.
It is expected that the FPA will greatly enhance family planning activities and thus, reduce Pakistans population growth rate.
The author is Senior Advisor on South Asia at Population Institute, Washington DC and Affiliated Professor of Public Policy, George Mason University, Arlington, VA USA. He co-authored a book Islam, the State and Population (Oxford University Press).
Analysis: Defusing the
