African Union head calls for end to child marriage

Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma makes plea at family planning talks as she attempts to allay fears over African population surge

theguardian.com, Claire Provost, Wednesday 13 November 2013

Child marriage and teenage pregnancies have been a focus of global family
planning talks in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Photograph: Dan Chung for the Guardian

Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, chair of the African Union (AU), has thrown her weight behind calls to end child marriage, which is increasingly being identified by human rights activists and public health experts as a priority concern.

"We must do away with child marriage," Dlamini-Zuma said in a speech at the opening ceremony of the largest international summit on family planning. In too many African countries "girls who end up as brides at a tender age are coerced into having children while they are children themselves".

The third international conference on family planning, which opened on Tuesday at the AU headquarters in Addis Ababa, includes a special focus on reducing the rate of teenage pregnancies and ensuring that young people also have access to contraception.

Dlamini-Zuma said it was paramount to keep up the momentum around expanding access to family planning, but argued that the conversation must go beyond fears of a "population explosion". "Family planning is not just about fewer kids," she said. Enabling women to have more choices about whether and when they have children must be seen as part of the "quest for women's emancipation".

There is concern that the global family planning agenda is being driven, at least in part, by those keen to stem population growth, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. The world population, now at 7.2 billion, could exceed 9.5 billion by 2050, according to UN estimates. More than half of this growth is expected in Africa, where the number of people is expected to more than double, from 1.1 billion to 2.4 billion.

Earlier this year, the veteran BBC presenter David Attenborough called for more debate about population control and controversially argued that famine in Africa was nature's response to too many people and not enough land.

Dlamini-Zuma and others at the Addis Ababa talks are determined to reframe the conversation about family planning, emphasising human rights and drawing links with issues such as child marriage.

The executive director of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), Babatunde Osotimehin, said it was critical that young people benefited from the resurgence of interest in, and funding for, family planning.

Africa is often referred to as the youngest continent, with an estimated 65% of its population below the age of 35. More than 35% are 15-35.

"Africa needs to grow its young people, and build its human capacity," said Osotimehin. "For as long as we have teenage pregnancies, in the kind of epidemic we have on this continent … we're not going to get there"

Before the summit's opening ceremony, more than two dozen African ministers attended a high-level meeting focused on how increasing access to family planning can contribute to long-term economic growth on the continent.

Osotimehin said child marriage was holding back progress in some areas, and that, while critical, it was not enough for governments to enact legislation against it.

Despite international commitments to end the practice, one in three girls in developing countries is married before the age of 18, and 50 million girls are at risk of being married before the age of 15 between now and 2020, according to a report published last month by the UNFPA.

Communities and traditional, local leaders must be brought into the conversation, said Osotimehin, which must tackle fundamental inequalities between boys and girls. "We must build gender-neutral societies … where girls [and boys] are treated the same," he said.

The conference aims to build on the momentum of last year's family planning summit in London, where donors pledged $2.6bn (£1.6bn) in new funding and committed to providing 120 million more women with access to modern contraceptives by 2020.

According to the first progress report on the London summit FP2020 commitments, published on Wednesday, a quarter of the countries that made commitments have since launched detailed, costed national family planning strategies and a third have increased their national budget allocations for family planning.

Some progress has also been made on developing new contraceptive technologies, according to the report, which highlights agreements to make two long-acting contraceptive implants – Jadelle and Implanon – available to some of the world's poorest countries at more than a 50% price reduction.

Valerie DeFillipo, director of the FP2020 taskforce, said there was a need for better indicators to measure informed choice, autonomy and the extent to which family planning programmes are being implemented in accordance with human rights principles. It is critical, she said, that women are not denied access to contraception and there is absolutely no coercion in rolling out family planning programmes.

Many countries and donors track progress using contraceptive prevalence rates, with data based primarily on surveys conducted every five years. These measures look simply at the percentage of women using contraceptives, regardless of what their experiences are.

As part of the FP2020 campaign, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is investing in new methods to collect more real-time data on family planning, using mobile technology, and gather information not only on contraceptive use but also the quality of health care, how choices are made, and how women access services.

"Our vision is, by 2020, to have a much more rigorous and robust approach to tracking rights-based programmes," DeFillipo said.

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"Recalibration of Free Choice"–  Mar 3, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) - (Subjects: (Old) Souls, Midpoint on 21-12-2012, Shift of Human Consciousness, Black & White vs. Color, 1 - Spirituality (Religions) shifting, Loose a Pope “soon”, 2 - Humans will change react to drama, 3 - Civilizations/Population on Earth,  4 - Alternate energy sources (Geothermal, Tidal (Paddle wheels), Wind), 5 – Financials Institutes/concepts will change (Integrity – Ethical) , 6 - News/Media/TV to change, 7 – Big Pharmaceutical company will collapse “soon”, (Keep people sick), (Integrity – Ethical)  8 – Wars will be over on Earth, Global Unity, … etc.) - (Text version)

“…  3 - Longer Life is Going to Happen, But…

Here is one that is a review. We keep bringing it up because Humans don't believe it. If you're going to start living longer, there are those who are frightened that there will be overpopulation. You've seen the way it is so far, and the geometric progression of mathematics is absolute and you cannot change it. So if you look at the population of the earth and how much it has shifted in the last two decades, it's frightening to you. What would change that progression?

The answer is simple, but requires a change in thinking. The answer is a civilization on the planet who understands a new survival scenario. Instead of a basic population who has been told to have a lot of children to enhance the race [old survival], they begin to understand the logic of a new scenario. The Akashic wisdom of the ages will start to creep in with a basic survival scenario shift. Not every single woman will look at herself and say, "The clock is ticking," but instead can say, "I have been a mother 14 times in a row. I'm going to sit this one out." It's a woman who understands that there is no loss or guilt in this, and actually feels that the new survival attribute is to keep the family small or not at all! Also, as we have said before, even those who are currently ignorant of population control will figure out what is causing babies to be born [Kryon joke].

Part of the new Africa will be education and healing, and eventually a zero population growth, just like some of the first-world nations currently have. Those who are currently tied to a spiritual doctrine will actually have that doctrine changed (watch for it) regarding Human birth. Then they will be able to make free choice that is appropriate even within the establishment of organized religion. You see, things are going to change where common sense will say, "Perhaps it would help the planet if I didn't have children or perhaps just one child." Then the obvious, "Perhaps I can exist economically better and be wiser with just one. It will help the one!" Watch for these changes. For those of you who are steeped in the tradition of the doctrines and would say that sounds outrageously impossible, I give you the new coming pope [Kryon smile]. For those of you who feel that uncontrolled procreation is inevitable, I encourage you to see statistics you haven't seen or didn't care to look at yet about what first-world countries have already accomplished on their own, without any mandates. It's already happening. That was number three.….”