Empowering women key to controlling population growth, UN says

About a dozen Lebanese women dressed as brides protest against a Lebanese law that allows a rapist to get away with his crime if he marries his victim in 2016. AP

Empowering women with education, health care and equal opportunities as well as giving them the power to make decisions about their bodies are key to controlling the world's growing number of people, the UN Population Fund said on Tuesday.

On World Population Day, the UN agency argued that these factors would result to a decline in unplanned pregnancies and lead to more controlled population growth.

The UN says the growing global population makes it difficult to carry out plans to end poverty or to ensure access to basic services such as health and education.

Although women and girls make up 49.7 per cent of the global population – which surpassed eight billion in last November, according to the UN – they “are often ignored in discussions on demographics, with their rights violated in population policies”, it said.

“This pervasive injustice keeps women and girls out of school, the workforce and leadership positions, limits their agency and ability to make decisions about their health and sexual and reproductive lives,” it added.

It also “heightens their vulnerability to violence, harmful practices and preventable maternal death”, with a woman dying every two minutes due to pregnancy or childbirth complications globally.

In its 2023 State of World Population report, the UNFPA found that 24 per cent of women and girls worldwide are unable to say no to sex and 25 per cent are unable to make decisions about their own health, while 11 per cent are unable to make decisions about contraception.

“Together, this means that only 56 per cent of women are able to make decisions over their sexual and reproductive health and rights,” the report says.

The most recent data from 68 countries showed that an estimated 44 per cent of women in relationships are unable to make decisions on health care, sex or contraception, it adds.

“The result? Nearly half of all pregnancies are unintended, an abrogation of women’s basic human right to decide freely and responsibly the number and spacing of their children,” UNFPA's executive director Natalia Kanem wrote in the report.

Ms Kanem added that a successful family planning scheme must prioritise “expanded efforts to realise bodily autonomy” and support sexual and reproductive health and rights for everyone.

Mena's population headaches

In some areas of the Middle East, poor census-taking and cultural norms around women's place in the family are delaying action on controlling population growth.

Iraq, for example, has not conducted a full census since 1987 – which put the population at 22 million.

Since then, UN-imposed sanctions in 1990s, the 2003 US-led invasion to topple Saddam Hussein’s regime, and resulting security and political instability have hindered efforts to hold another.

But in the absence of a national census, Iraq’s Central Organisation for Statistics and Information Technology conducts a calculation based mainly on the country's annual growth or birth rate.

The most recent estimation in January put the population at about 42.3 million as of last year, based on an annual increase rate of 2.5 per cent.

The UNFPA, however, estimates the population to be at about 45.5 million as of 2023, with 59 per cent of the population aged between 15 and 64.

In the region's most populous nation, Egypt, modest estimates put the population at 104 million, but UN data shows that there could be up to 112 million, including foreign residents.

A census was last carried out in 2017, one of 14 in the past 135 years, registering a population of only 40 million.

Egypt has continued to grapple with its booming birth rate amid growing concerns over the state of its economy and the availability of vital resources.

President Abdel Fattah El Sisi has, throughout his seven years in power, repeatedly outlined the country’s population as a major obstacle to its attempts to develop and curb poverty.

But this is not a new issue. In the 1960s, late president and pan-Arab leader Gamal Abdel Nasser famously asked: “How are we supposed to feed 30 million people with our resources?”

Although the government has succeeded in reducing the birth rate from 3.5 per woman in 2014 to 2.8 in 2021, it says this is still far short of what is needed.

A May meeting of Egypt’s National Dialogue, a public forum aiming to convene the country’s divided political factions to discuss its most pressing issues, outlined six areas that need to be tackled to manage population growth: poor population distribution, early marriage, recurrent pregnancies, customs and traditions, illiteracy and poverty.

However, critics of the government, including prominent rights groups such as the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, have suggested that the government line on population could be “alarmist” and that if more funds were invested in cultivating Egyptians through educational and unemployment reform, a large population could be beneficial for economic growth.

Egyptian government family planning schemes are also largely focused on regulating women over men. A policy announced in March saw women over 45 offered 1,000 Egyptian pounds annually if they have only two children.

Bucking the trend

Unlike most countries in the Middle East, Lebanon’s population has declined in recent years, especially as a devastating economic crisis which began in 2019 drove many of its residents to emigrate in search of better opportunities.

Yet the small Mediterranean country remains one of the most densely populated in the world, coming in at 18th place in 2021, according to the UN.

The population decline has done little to stem the overcrowding of its urban centres, with the vast majority of Lebanon’s population – 89 per cent – residing in cities.

By UN estimates, more than half of the country’s population resides in the capital Beirut and its suburbs alone.

Saudi Arabia, despite seeing a rise in population more generally, is seeing a downwards trend in the number of children born to each family.

The General Authority for Statistics revealed recently that 39.3 per cent of Saudi families do not include children or elderly dependents.

“An urban population will always affect the stats as couples who work jobs in the city have less time to raise bigger families today. But Saudi Arabia and our Arab brothers, we are known to have big families,” Hassan Salem, a Saudi citizen in Tabuk, tells The National.

“I have eight siblings but most of us only have three to four kids now, so it is changing.”

Ayad Kamal, a Saudi citizen in Riyadh, said: “We live in smaller apartment as opposed to our family homes. Our parents prefer to live in their home in Jeddah where they are more comfortable as opposed to living with us here.”

In the 2022 Saudi census, issued by the General Authority for Statistics, the total number of households, Saudis and non-Saudis, stood at 8.2 million, of which five million families did not have dependents.

The census also put the total population of Saudi Arabia at 36.6 million, an increase on last year's 32.2 million. Of those, 63 per cent were under the age of 30.

Women taking a larger role in society could also be affecting the number of children born, some said.

“A lot of women are independent this is the first time in their lives they get to live a life of their own and work where they want, live where they want,” says Ghada Alaam, a Saudi citizen in Jeddah.

“I moved from Abha to Riyadh and now Jeddah. I am focused on my career and look forward to starting my family – there is no rush.”