Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) and the empowerment of women and girls are

The International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo in 1994 saw an essential assertion of the primacy of considering issues related to population and development in a human rights context, focussed on the individual, and on the centrality of reproductive rights and the empowerment of women. [...] Meanwhile, in the words of a 2020 UNICEF report, the drop in numbers of boys and girls out of school has “stagnated” since 2007: in sub-Saharan Africa, the number of girls out of secondary school has increased by 7 million due to the region’s population growthvii. [...] These young people (all potential parents) put pressure on the already scanty education and health services in the country, and the environment is not spared either.”viii Florence Mujaasi Blondel, Ugandan journalist and population campaigner The relationship between population and the Sustainable Development Goals is explored explicitly in Population Matters’ 2020 report, Hitting the targets: the. [...] There is no room for complacency regarding potential abuses in pursuit of reduced population growth, but if the SRHR community in the 2020s focusses on the history of population control rather than the Handmaid’s Tale future threatened (and in some respects, already here) of the nationalistic pro-natal agenda, critical gains of SRHR and girl’s education stand to be lost. [...] For more information, see populationmatters.org Population Matters report (2020) Hitting the targets: the case for ethical and empowering population policies to accelerate progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals Population Matters briefing (2020) The unmet contraceptive needs of women and girls Population Matters briefing (2020) The climate crisis: why population matters Population Matt.