As the United Nations continues negotiations on a new set of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for its post-2015 development agenda, population experts are hoping reproductive health will be given significant recognition in the final line-up of the goals later this year.
An African proverb says “a child that we refuse to build today will end up selling the house that we may build tomorrow.”
As the U.N. focuses on refining its Post-2015 Development Agenda, divisions surrounding issues of population and development continue to plague consensus on a universal way forward.
Lawmakers and civil society leaders from over 30 countries are calling for universal access to safe, legal abortion.
When the United Nations hosts one of its mega conferences - whether on population, human rights, food security or sustainable development - there is always a demand for full and active participation of often-marginalised groups, including women, civil society, indigenous peoples and youth.
As the world moves closer to the 2015 end mark of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), a new U.N. report illuminates how far global society has come, but also how far it still must travel to achieve its objectives.
Last week, I had the privilege of attending the Delhi Sustainable Development Summit, an annual event that deals with a subject that is very close to my heart. The summit gathered together amazing people: Nobel Prize winners, thought leaders, heads of state, corporate innovators, and academicians to deal with the paramount challenges of the 21st Century all focused on three pressing dimensions of sustainability: food, water and energy.
Latin America and the Caribbean should play a central role in the construction of “sexual citizenship” - a concept that covers a series of population-related issues, rights and guarantees that this region helped build since the United Nations first emerged, says Brazilian expert Carmen Barroso.
Shortcomings in the educational system in Latin America and the Caribbean fuel inequalities that remain hurdles to access to the labour market and safe sex for a large part of the region’s youth.
When the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) participates in a regional review conference in the Uruguayan capital of Montevideo next week, it will take stock of the successes and failures of a wide range of gender-related issues, including reproductive health, sexual violence, women's rights, maternal mortality, and the spread of HIV/AIDS – all of them relating to Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC).
Ishita Chaudhry spent the past 36 hours listening to U.N. delegates discuss population growth and development. She noticed that on “controversial” topics, such as sexual and reproductive rights, young people’s voices often get lost.
Gathered at the Ford Foundation in New York Monday, international luminaries, family planning experts and women's rights activists repeatedly expressed a common sentiment: “I cannot believe that we are still having this discussion today."