The \u2018Pakistan Population Summit\u2019 \u2014 a national dialogue on restoring balance and building sustainable futures \u2014 has begun in Islamabad to emphasise the need to recognise population planning as an investment in the country\u2019s development.<\/p>\n
Organised by DawnMedia, the two-day summit is bringing toge\u00adther politicians, economists, development specialists, private sector leaders, and experts to develop a shared vision as the rising population continues to place pressure on health systems, food and water security, and employment.<\/p>\n
Pakistan, with a population of over 241 million, is the fifth most populous country in the world, adding four to five million people every year. Its population growth rate of 2.40 per cent is the highest in South Asia.<\/p>\n
The rapid increase is outpacing employment opportunities, with official statistics showing the country will require 104m jobs by 2040. Pakistan will not be able to achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030 if the current trajectory of population growth does not slow down.<\/p>\n
View the full agenda here.<\/p>\n
3:36pm \u2014 Population Association of Pakistan president says govts \u2018not serious enough\u2019<\/p>\n
Population Association of Pakistan President Professor Mehtab S. Karim said that none of the \u201csuccessive governments after Gen Ayub Khan\u2019s removal\u201d were serious enough about population programming in Pakistan, except for ex-PM Benazir Bhutto.<\/p>\n
Prof Karim also brought up Bangladesh as a case study, pointing out the rising contraceptive prevalence rate (CPR) there, leading to the average number of children per woman of two, compared to Pakistan \u201cstill struggling\u201d with over three children per woman.<\/p>\n
3:27pm \u2014 Indonesian envoy details his country\u2019s efforts<\/p>\n
Rahmat Hindiarta Kusuma, social affairs coordinator at the Indonesian embassy, noted that Indonesia had ranked among the top six most populous countries since the 1960s.<\/p>\n
\u201cHowever, the international community has considered Indonesia as one of the countries having a strong and successful family planning initiatives in the world,\u201d Kusuma highlighted.<\/p>\n
He cited figures of declining fertility rate in Indonesia and rising CPR in the 1990s.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe crisis gave us very incredible experience,\u201d he said, adding that people learned that having family planning was beneficial for them.<\/p>\n
Kusuma recalled that Indonesia organised dialogues and events to promote the importance of family planning, with enforcement encouraged among men as well, not just women.<\/p>\n
Rahmat Hindiarta Kusuma, social affairs coordinator at the Indonesian embassy in Islamabad, speaks at the summit. \u2014 Mohammad Asim\/White Star
\n3:23pm \u2014 \u2018Should include chapter on small families in academic curriculum\u2019<\/p>\n
Dr Rashid Amjad said there was much to learn from Bangladesh, which had got \u201csome tailwinds\u201d of the youth dividend.<\/p>\n
He also mentioned the \u201cflexibility\u201d that Iran and Egypt were trying to build into their population growth strategy. \u201cEgypt is very similar to us [\u2026] [President] Sisi is very clear \u2014 two-child family,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Dr Amjad underscored the need to educate the youth about the benefits of \u201chappy, healthy, smaller families\u201d, calling for the topic to be incorporated into primary and higher education curricula.<\/p>\n
He also suggested the formation of a high-level \u201cSpecial Demographic Dividend Facilitation Council\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The \u2018Pakistan Population Summit\u2019 \u2014 a national dialogue on restoring balance and building sustainable futures \u2014 has begun in Islamabad to emphasise the need to recognise population planning as an investment in the country\u2019s development. Organised by DawnMedia, the two-day summit is bringing toge\u00adther politicians, economists, development specialists, private sector leaders, and experts to develop […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13769,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13768","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13768","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13768"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13768\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13770,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13768\/revisions\/13770"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13769"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13768"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13768"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13768"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}