Family Planning: Empowering People, Developing Nations

The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare’s initiative on family planning includes communication camps that will use a 360 degree approach.

Editorial Team | Published: July 11, 2017 5:50 pm

Tags: Population World Population Day 2017

Health Minitser JP Nadda on the occasion of World Population Day announced 146 districts in the Mission Parivar Vikas programme and that 24 states have achieved replacement level fertility of 2.1. The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare’s initiative on family planning includes communication camps that will use a 360 degree approach including posters, a website and a toll-free helpline. International organisations have for long advocated the need to perceive reproductive rights through the prism of human rights. While a rights-based approach to the subject does not yet exist, various international conferences even in the distant past have time and again referred to family planning, and reproductive health and rights as human rights issues. The International Conference on Human Rights held in Tehran in 1968, for instance, stated that “parents have a basic human right to decide freely and responsibly the number and spacing of their children” (UN 1968: 4). A number of subsequent international summits upheld similar views. This underscores the possibilities of leveraging human rights instruments to address the exigencies of the Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights sector in the developing world, starting with recognizing the critical link between reproductive rights and women’s empowerment. It is a couple’s right to choose the number of kids they want if they desire to become parents.According to the recent National Family Health Survey (NFHS) IV data, the unmet need is 12.9 and this contributes to undesired fertility due to lack of access. Addressing this will bring more couples into the gamut of contraceptive choices and reduce the incidence of unplanned pregnancies in the country. Data has shown that increasing one contraceptive method in an existing basket of choicehas resulted in an 8 to 12 per cent increase in the use of modern contraceptives. Providing couples access and choice to quality family planning in developing countries has a direct positive impact on indicators of maternal mortality, infant mortality and women’s empowerment. Family planning is also extremely cost-effective and has shown radical improvements in other developing nations like Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka[1]. A study[2]has shown that every dollar that is invested in family planning saves 4 dollars in other health and development expenditure including maternal health, immunization, education and water and sanitation. It empowers women and gives them the opportunity to realise their full potential through education and livelihood and enables them to make informed choices about their sexual and reproductive health. Lack of access to family planning jeopardises the health of the mother and subsequently that of her child – this results in increasing rates of maternal and infant mortality. The implication of this is an unhealthy population that poses impediments to the progress and development we can achieve as a nation. Family planning is a tool that can empower people by preventing the vicious cycle of unplanned and unhealthy families that is counteractive to economic growth. On World Population Day this year, we will be representing India in London at the Family Planning Summit. The FP2020 goals will be reviewed and discussed to ensure that more women and girls are provided universal access to quality family planning services and are able to plan their families and future.

About Population Foundation of India:

Population Foundation of India (PFI) is at the forefront of policy advocacy and research on population issues in the country. Established in 1970, by a group of socially committed industrialists led by Mr.J.R.D. Tata and Dr. Bharat Ram, the institution was initially called the Family Planning Foundation. It got its present name in 1993. The foundation aimed to supplement and complement the government’s efforts and galvanize voluntary action to support activities that address population issues and concerns in India. Today, PFI partners with the Indian government, collaborating with central, state and local government institutions for the formulation of gender sensitive population, health and development policies and their implementation. Working with NGOs, PFI reaches out to the underserved and the un-served areas of the country, with a special focus on the eight Empowered Action Group (EAG) States of Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand. (Read: Maharashtra introduces injectable contraceptives for women: 6 things to know about Medroxyprogesterone Acetate (MPA) )

Published: July 11, 2017 5:50 pm

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