Dev Kumar Sunuwar

MAR 02 –
The global population growth rate has come down to 1.10 percent per annum from its peak of 2.2 percent in 1962-63. The slowdown is the result of rapid spread of contraception use and the disinclination among women of the industrialised world to have babies. Countries like Russia and Japan have seen their growth rates plummet below the replacement level — there are not enough babies to replace the current workforce. A growth rate of 2.1 percent, just enough to replace the number of currently living people, is considered healthy. Currently, Nepal’s population is growing at 2.3 percent per annum.

The government hopes to bring down the rate to the replacement level of 2.1 percent by 2017 through various population control measures — a part of its 20-year Population Perspective Plan (PPP) finalised in the first week of February by an expert committee under the Ministry of Health and Population (MoHP). The PPP aims to bring population growth under control as a part of the government’s poverty reduction strategy. Accordingly, population control measures will be integrated with other plans and programmes focused at improving peoples’ standard of living.

There is considerable body of research linking population growth with a high level of poverty. Invariably, the countries with the most rapid population growths are among the poorest (Liberia, Burundi, Afghanistan) while the richest countries are growing (or even shrinking) in population. It is a self-reinforcing cycle for developing nations: the fewer the people, the more attention they are likely to get from their government. A better educated and healthy people, in turn, are likely to

breed less.

Considering the benefits of a small (but well looked after) population, it is surprising that the policymakers have been sitting on PPP for 14 years. Remarkably, the MoHP, in assistance from the United Nations Population Fund, had come up with the framework of PPP way back in 1996. Since, the plan has continually been shelved by successive governments. The reconstituted National Population Committee, chaired by Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal, it is now hoped, will be able to give its final stamp of approval to the draft plan without any further ado.

The beauty of PPP lies in its integrated approach to population management. Among the major challenges for PPP will spreading awareness of family planning among rural youths who contribute the most towards population growth. Protecting and promoting sexual and reproductive rights of women, with the level of awareness on the crucial issue dismal in rural Nepal, won’t be easy as well. But if things go as planned, the integrated PPP approach will help remove many of these difficulties that mostly result form lack of coordination between different government and non-government bodies involved in poverty and population reduction programmes. It is vital the country keeps a lid on its population to avert untoward consequences like unlivably crowded cities and unsustainable depletion of its valuable resources.