• by IPS Correspondents (london)
• Friday, November 18, 1994
• Inter Press Service

LONDON, Nov 18 (IPS) - A multitude of projects are being planned to put the grand ideas of the U.N. International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) into effective action on the ground, say the heads of the world's family planning organisations.

But under the hype of good intentions, there lies real concern that the broad policy of the plan will deflect scarce funds away from core activities -- the provision of contraceptives and family planning counselling to ordinary women.

Delegates met in London this week for the four-day annual meeting of the Central Council of the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) to discuss how best to carry forward the recommendations of the ICPD, held in Cairo in September.

The Cairo conference was deemed a great success by many, though the language was not forceful enough to satisfy some.

Britain's Minister for Overseas Development Lynda Chalker said at a reception Thursday: "Cynics have suggested that the language of the Cairo Programme is rhetoric, and that the promises made by political leaders in national delegations are unlikely to be fully implemented. But politicians the world over have stressed that the ICPD vision is an idea whose time has come."

In her speech, delivered by David Nabarro of the British Overseas Development Administration (ODA), she pledged the ODA to continue its partnership with community run family planning and reproductive health programmes, and provide increasing support through bilateral programmes.

Britain is giving 100 million pounds (150 million dollars) over the next two years to fund 50 health and population projects in developing countries, up from 32 million pounds in 1993.

The funding is sorely needed, according to Abdulkadir Abdullahi, chairman of the Nigerian Family Planning Association (FPA), where contraceptive prevalence has doubled in recent years but the use of modern methods still remains one of the lowest in the world, largely due to lack of access and affordability.

Impressed with the organisational abilities of women delegates in Cairo, Abdullahi is now seeking to make use of the so far largely untapped potential of women's groups in Nigeria. He plans to get these groups together to pinpoint problems and solutions before carrying the family planning message back to women that it otherwise could not reach, he told IPS.

© Inter Press Service (2014) — All Rights Reserved. Original source: Inter Press Service

Where next?

Advertisement