UN warns of population explosion

[Talon]

UN warns of population explosion

The population of developing countries will soar unless donors give more funds to reproductive health programmes, a UN Population Fund report says.

The world's 50 poorest countries will triple in size by 2050, surging to 1.7 billion people, it predicts.

Donors have been giving only half the funds pledged at a conference in Cairo in 1994, UNFPA told BBC News Online.

The money is used for programmes supporting women's rights and health care in the developing world.

UNFPA's State of the World Population 2004 report examines progress made since Cairo, when wealthy countries pledged to give an annual $6.1bn to the fund.

William Ryan, the report's author, told BBC News Online that the fund was $3bn short.

"Without access to health services and education the population will continue to increase, above all in the poorest countries," he said.

US holds back

By 2050, UNFPA says, there will be 8.9 billion people sharing the planet, a slight decrease from earlier official predictions.

The US - the fund's largest donor - has blocked its donations to the body for the past three years.

The Bush administration froze $34m in funding, citing allegations that the UNFPA was involved in forced abortions in China - a charge consistently denied by the organisation.

"We note that with an additional $34m we could help provide family planning to thousands of women who need it," Mr Ryan said.

Aids impact

In addition to the threat of overpopulation, half a million women now die annually during childbirth in the developing world.

The fund says gaps in reproductive health care - a lack of access to information, care and practical resources like contraceptives - accounts for nearly 20% of the worldwide burden of illness and premature death.

Providing contraception for the 200 million women who want it, at a cost of $3.9bn, would avert some 52 million pregnancies each year and avoid 1.4 million infant deaths, it says.

Aids has also affected the changes in population size, the report says - the 38 African countries most affected by Aids are projected to have 823 million people in 2015.

The figure is 91 million fewer than if no Aids deaths had occurred but over 50% more than today.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/3658258.stm

oh bl**dy h*ll

Edited September 15, 2004 by Talon S.

[Talon]

Slowing population 'lacks funds'

Efforts to slow down the growth of the world's population by linking poverty relief to women's rights and access to birth control are working, the UN says.

But it says that a lack of money, gaps in provision and gender bias are making further progress difficult to achieve.

The UN Population Fund (UNFPA) uses its 2004 annual report to sound a warning about the mounting challenges it sees.

The report is a review of progress made since the 1994 international conference on population and development in Egypt.

The State Of World Population 2004 is entitled The Cairo Consensus At Ten: Reproductive Health And The Global Effort To End Poverty.

It says the Cairo plan, adopted by 179 countries, sought to balance the world's people with its resources, improve women's status, and ensure universal access to reproductive health care, including family planning.

The plan "gave priority to investing in people and broadening their opportunities, rather than to reducing population growth."

Among the changes the report notes is an increase in the use of modern contraception, from 55% of couples in 1994 to 61% today. But it says about 201 million women still have an unmet need for effective contraception.

It says: "Meeting their needs would cost about $3.9bn a year, and prevent 23 million unplanned births, 22m induced abortions, 142,000 pregnancy-related deaths and 1.4 million infant deaths."

Resource shortfall

Implementing the Cairo agenda costs money, it says, but resources are short. Donors agreed in 1994 to provide $6.1bn a year for population and reproductive health programmes by 2005, a third of the total needed.

In 2002, the last year for which figures are available, contributions were about $3.1bn, barely half the total promised.

In 2003 developing countries themselves were spending about $11.7bn on the Cairo agenda. But much of that was spent by a few large countries, leaving the poorest ones heavily dependent on outside help.

The reality means more than 350 million couples still lack access to a full range of family planning services, and 529,000 women die annually from complications of pregnancy and childbirth, most of them preventable.

Five million new HIV infections occurred in 2003: nearly half of all infected adults are women, and nearly three-fifths of those in sub-Saharan Africa.

In some areas in the region 25% of the workforce is HIV-positive. The report says studies show that if 15% of a country's population is HIV-positive, its GDP will decline by 1% annually.

The report spells out some of the pressures of population growth:

about 2.8 billion people, two in five of those alive, survive on the equivalent of less than $2 a day

about half the world's original forests have now been cleared, and three-quarters of its fish stocks are being exploited at or beyond sustainable limits

half a billion people live in countries where water is scarce: by 2025, the number is expected to be 2.4-3.4 billion people

a majority of the world's people will be living in cities by 2007, and by 2030 all regions will have urban majorities.

The report says the Earth's population is likely to increase from 6.4 billion people today to 8.9 billion by 2050, with the 50 poorest countries tripling in total numbers to 1.7bn people.

It says poverty dramatically increases a woman's chances of dying: "The lifetime risk of a woman dying in pregnancy or childbirth in West Africa is 1 in 12. In developed regions, the comparable risk is 1 in 4,000."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3655028.stm

[AztecInca]

Here is a global problem that we all need to work together to try and improve and even eventually fix. All the developed countries have enough money to help all the poorer nations but they just wont spend it, they need to build bigger bombs, more nukes, submarines etc.....

Its sad, here is something that we need to unite on and work together but unless those in power see some profit to be made, then it ain`t going to happen!

[Velikovsky]

Let the population explode, seal the borders. They'll start killing each other off and the populations will stabilize into a healthy pattern.

I have no niceness in me tonight.