PHA-Exchange> LOWER FERTILITY RATES PROVIDE "WINDOW OF OPPORTUNITY" FOR DEVELOPMENT - UN REPORT

[Claudio]

From: "Vern Weitzel" <vern.weitzel at undp.org>
LOWER FERTILITY RATES PROVIDE “WINDOW OF OPPORTUNITY” FOR DEVELOPMENT – UN
REPORT
New York, Sep  8 2005 11:00AM
The halving of fertility rates in developing countries, and a dip in the
birth rate of even the
least developed ones, provides a “window of opportunity” to reaching
international development
goals, according to a United Nations report released today in anticipation
of the coming World
Summit in New York.

According to the report, Population Challenges and Development Goals, issued
by the Population
Division of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), the
reductions, which began in
the 1970s, have lowered the percentage of children in the population and
increased the proportion of
persons of working age in developing countries.

Provided jobs are available for the rising number of workers, the report
says that developing
countries can reap the benefits of increased production along with the
lessened burden of decreasing
proportion of dependent children.

>From 1950 to 2005, the report states, fertility rates in “less-developed”
countries, developing
countries not in the poorest category, plummeted from 6.2 births per family
to 2.8.   Countries in
Asia, many of whom fit that category, went from six births to 2.4.

Among the 50 least developed countries, most of which are located in Africa,
the rate fell from 6.7
births per family in 1950 to 5.0 in 2005.   Though not as sharp a decline,
the report finds the 20
per cent drop a hopeful sign toward the alleviation of the high population
growth pressures that
most affect these countries.

Since countries with extreme poverty are still expected to experience at
least a quarter of all
population growth occurring in the next 10 years, DESA says that those
countries will benefit most
from the reduction of fertility brought about by the prevention of unwanted
births, a goal of the
programme of action of the International Conference on Population and
Development (ICPD), a
UN-sponsored body.