early half of all pregnancies, 121 million each year throughout the world, are unintended. For the women and girls affected, the most life-altering reproductive choice, whether or not to become pregnant, is no choice at all, says the State of World Population Report 2022, released by the UNFPA. This concern has been further promoted in the theme of this year’s World Population Day, July 11, focusing on ways to safeguard the health and rights of women and girls now and putting the brakes on Covid-19. Population issues include family planning, gender equality, mother and newborn health, child marriage, human and reproductive rights. The World Population Day emphasises the importance of reproductive health and how it affects overall growth and development plans and programmes globally.

In 2011, the world reached a population of seven billion. This year, it will hit the eight billion mark. UNFPA research had highlighted during the Covid-19 lockdowns that if there was a major disruption to health services, 47 million women in low and middle-income countries might not have access to modern contraceptives. This, it said, would, lead to seven million unintended pregnancies. It could also lead to a rise in gender-based violence, cases of female genital mutilation and child marriages. Even though the pace of global population growth will continue to decline in the coming decades, the world population is likely to be 20-30 percent larger in 2050 than in 2020.

Having accurate estimates of population trends and reliable forecasts of future changes, including the size of populations and their distributions by age, sex and geographical location, is required for policy formulation and implementation and as a guide to assist countries towards sustainable development.

In 1994, the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) was held in Cairo, where a revolutionary Program of Action was adopted by 179 governments. It called for women’s reproductive health and rights to take centre stage in global and national development efforts. This programme focused on comprehensive reproductive health care, including family planning, safe pregnancy, childbirth services, and prevention and treatment of sexually transmitted infections. For socio-economic development and societal advancement guaranteeing improvements in reproductive health and female empowerment are necessary.

According to World Population Clock, we are at the 790 million people mark in 2021. The population is increasing by 83 million (1.10 percent) per year. The global population is expected to reach 860 million in 2030.

In the 1960s, Pakistan was one of the pioneering countries integrating family planning into primary health care services. Currently, it lags behind regional countries with family planning indicators characterised by a stagnated level of modern contraceptive prevalence, high unmet need and poor quality of care.

Pakistan particularly struggles with high maternal mortality ratios, adolescent birth rates and unmet need for contraception. The country has the third-highest maternal, fetal and child mortality burden globally. Major gaps remain at both service delivery and policy level, preventing adequate access to basic health facilities.

With an estimated 221 million people, Pakistan has the fifth largest population globally, the fourth largest in Asia and the second-largest among Muslim countries. The demographic profile of Pakistan shows an inter-censual growth rate of 2.4 percent, a fertility rate of 3.6 children per woman and a modern contraceptive prevalence rate of 25 percent - one of the lowest in South Asia.

Pakistan particularly struggles with high maternal mortality ratios, adolescent birth rates and unmet need for contraception. The country has the third-highest maternal, fetal and child mortality burden globally. Major gaps remain at both service delivery and policy levels, preventing adequate access to basic health facilities. The family planning community in Pakistan needs to learn from the success of other Muslim countries, including Iran, Turkey and Bangladesh.

Major factors responsible for high population growth in Pakistan are high fertility, a low contraceptive prevalence rate, unmet need for family planning, declining mortality, early marriages, son preference, poverty, illiteracy, especially among women, and a lack of women empowerment.

Access to family planning services in Pakistan varies between urban and rural areas. It takes on average 40 minutes to reach a reproductive health facility in urban areas, while it takes 96 minutes in rural areas. Goals set earlier in the 2002 policy for Pakistan were to achieve a Total Fertility Rate (TFR) of 2.1 by 2015. This has been deferred to 2022 and beyond. Pakistan had committed itself to attaining a Contraceptive Prevalence Rate (CPR) goal of 55 percent by 2020. It has still to be achieved.

The National Action Plan (NAP) spells out the actions required to implement each of the Council of Common Interests’ (CCI) recommendations with timelines, budgets, and output/ impact indicators as evidence of the implementation. The NAP focuses on the key areas of governance and accountability, ensuring universal access to family planning and reproductive health services, finances, legislation, advocacy and communications, curriculum and training, contraceptive commodity safety and the participation of ulema in promoting family planning and reproductive health.

As a member of the global family planning community and a signatory to family planning commitments, Pakistan is also working to redefine its population programmes by strengthening its collaborative partnership networks, increasing resource mobilisation and improved governance. The CCI has approved the recommendations and targets of the National and Provincial Task Forces.

The FP/ RH transformative vision set in by UNFPA at the International Conference on Population and Development-25 Nairobi Summit, which was held from 12-14 November, boasted of “three zeros by 2030”, i.e. zero unmet need for contraception; zero preventable maternal deaths, and zero gender-based violence and harmful practices. More people require more food, more jobs, more energy and social services and necessities of life. Disappointments on these counts result in restlessness, frustration, violence and unrest. It is high time the social stakeholders took it upon themselves to resolve the rising concern of uncontrolled population growth.

The writer is a playwright and freelance journalist and can be reached at pashajaved1@gmail.com and his blogging site: soulandland.com