Archive for: Population


There is a sizeable body of literature that explores the connections between population and climate change and family planning as a link between the two. Overall, family planning has been proposed as both a means of preventing further climate change by slowing population growth, and thereby reducing consumption, and as a tool to equip vulnerable individuals, households, communities, and countries to better manage the challenges of a warming world. The following review summarizes the academic literature, conference papers, and UN reports from the last decade, exploring the background of these two perspectives, with an emphasis on family planning as a strategy of climate change adaptation, particularly for women.

Year: 2013

Source: PAI

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    This paper analyzes the first 40 National Adaptation Programmes of Action reports submitted by governments of least-developed countries to the Global Environment Facility for funding. Of these documents, 93% identified at least one of three ways in which demographic trends interact with the effects of climate change: (i) faster degradation of the sources of natural resources; (ii) increased demand for scarce resources; and (iii) heightened human vulnerability to extreme weather events. These findings suggest that voluntary access to family planning services should be made more available to poor communities in least-developed countries. The article stresses the distinction between this approach, which prioritizes the welfare of poor communities affected by climate change, versus the argument that population growth should be slowed to limit increases in global carbon emissions. The paper concludes by calling for increased support for rights-based family planning services, including those integrated with HIV/AIDS services, as an important complementary measure to climate change adaptation programmes in developing countries.

    Year: 2009

    Source: Bulletin of the World Health Organization

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      This training resource was produced by the Green Belt Movement (GBM) and FHI 360 as part of the USAID-supported Program on Research for Strengthening Services (PROGRESS) Project in Kenya. GBM and FHI 360 developed this training manual to prepare Green Volunteers to implement activities that link population, health and the environment. The manual was revised based on feedback from pilot project trainings and research findings. The training manual can be used to guide a training that introduces Green Volunteers to PHE and to family planning, covers healthy timing and spacing of pregnancies, offers skills-building opportunities, demonstrates how to use the PHE flip-book, and reviews basic reporting requirements for the project. The training manual, which is written in English, includes participant handouts in both English and Swahili, reporting forms, and a post-training evaluation form.

      Year: 2013

      Source: Green Belt Movement | FHI 360

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        Slowing the rapid growth of human population through strengthened voluntary family planning services would powerfully and inexpensively contribute to improvements in food security and the reduction of the greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change. A confluence of long-term environmental and population trends is undermining world food availability and driving climate change. These trends include quickening climate changes and difficulty adapting to its effects; widespread depletion of water, soils and fisheries; increased diversion of grains from human consumption to bio-fuel production and livestock and poultry feed; rapid population growth, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia; and increasing affluence in middle income countries.

        Year: 2015

        Source: Bixby Center for Global Reproductive Health

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          Burkina Faso’s National Plan for Accelerating Family Planning 2017–2020 is a strategic costed implementation plan developed with technical support from HP+ with a clear vision, strategic objectives, and plan to achieve national family planning goals. The Ministry of Health, with support of technical and financial partners, developed this roadmap to accelerate efforts around family planning and increase the modern contraceptive prevalence rate to 32 percent by 2020. This plan is intended to contribute to a decline in population growth, improvement of maternal and child health, and economic and social development of the country. It is also a tool for resource mobilization and monitoring and evaluation of the activities proposed.

          Year: 2017

          Source: Health Policy Plus

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            Humans and the ecosystem services they depend on are threatened by climate change. Places with high or growing human population as well as increasing climate variability, have a reduced ability to provide ecosystem services just as the need for these services is most critical. A spiral of vulnerability and ecosystem degradation often ensues in such places. We apply different global conservation schemes as proxies to examine the spatial relation between wet season precipitation, population change over three decades, and natural resource conservation. Identifying areas of climate and population risk and their overlap with conservation priorities can help to target activities and resources that promote biodiversity and ecosystem services while improving human well-being.

            Year: 2017

            Source: PLOS One

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            Parts of Africa have the most rapid population growth in the world. In addition, recent studies by climatologists suggest that, in coming decades, ecologically vulnerable areas of Africa, including the Sahel, will be exposed to the harshest adverse effects of global warming. Fortunately, there are evidence-based achievable policies which can greatly ameliorate what would otherwise be a slowly unfolding catastrophe of stunning magnitude. But to succeed, such measures must be taken immediately and on a large scale. Taken together, rapid population growth and climate change pose a serious threat to the livelihood of the majority of the one hundred million people now living in the Sahel region and about two hundred million more who will live there in a generation’s time. This paper encourages working across silos to address these interrelated challenges.

            Year: 2013

            Source: African Journal of Reproductive Health

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              The purpose of this paper is to assess the costs and benefits of targets for population and demography. The authors show that, for high fertility countries, providing universal access to sexual and reproductive health rights and meeting unmet need for contraception are phenomenal targets for the post-2015 agenda. For developed countries with ageing populations, a good strategy is to encourage people to retire later. Furthermore, instead of attempting to increase fertility organically, it is better to expand migration to rejuvenate an ageing population.

              Year: 2014

              Source: Copenhagen Consensus Center

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                Highlights from the updated People in the Balance database (no longer online) illustrate how population growth exerts pressure on available natural resources, especially in countries experiencing rapid growth. The database provides information about the availability of three critical resources—freshwater, cropland and forests. It also includes data for population growth, which has important implications for resource availability.

                Year: 2011

                Source: PAI

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                  The 2019 Revision of World Population Prospects is the twenty-sixth round of official United Nations population estimates and projections that have been prepared by the Population Division of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations Secretariat.

                  The main results are presented in a series of Excel files displaying key demographic indicators for each UN development group, World Bank income group, geographic region, Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) region, subregion and country or area for selected periods or dates within 1950-2100. For advanced users who need to use these data in a database form or statistical software, we recommend to use the CSV format for bulk download. Forthcoming special aggregates will also provide additional groupings of countries.

                  Year: 2019

                  Source: United Nations

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