ISLAMABAD: Country Director of Population Council Dr Ali M. Mir has claimed that per capita agricultural land has declined by approximately 80 per cent since 1965, adding that population was not a standalone issue as it was directly connected to water security, urbanisation, agricultural land, food security and nutrition, as well as women’s education and empowerment.
He was speaking to participants of a meeting held under the theme ‘Media for Informed Action on Population Stabilisation’. The event was held in collaboration withUNFPA.
Mr Mir underscored the need to keep the relationship between population growth and Pakistan’s increasingly constrained resources at the centre of the development debate.
Deputy Chief (Population), Kazim Salman, Ministry of Planning, briefed participants on the composition and mandate of the newly constituted National Population Council (NPC). Chaired by the prime minister and comprising the four chief ministers, the prime minister of AJK, the chief minister of Gilgit-Baltistan and key federal ministers, the council has been given broader executive and financial authority, with the planning commission serving as its Secretariat.He said the government’s approach has expanded beyond family planning to six interconnected investment areas health, education, youth, women’s participation in the labour force, skills development and social protection. ‘Population planning rests on two things: rights and responsibilities, and population is the balance between the two,’ he said.
He added that the government was moving from a direct service-delivery role towards a facilitating, regulating and enabling role. A National Population Declaration has also been shared with the provinces to build consensus around priorities and indicators while respecting provincial autonomy, supported by a dashboardto track progress.
Presenting evidence on access to family planning services, Director Programs, Population Council, Dr Iram Kamran, shared findings from the ‘Karain Zindagi Aasaan’ family planning voucher model, developed in partnership with the Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) andthe PunjabPopulationInnovation Fund and tested in Rahim Yar Khan.
Against a target of 20,000 women, approximately 22,000 women were served during the ten-month intervention. Contraceptive use in the intervention area increased from 53.5 per cent to 59pc, while unmet need among poor and poorest women declined from 10.7pc to 6.5pc. ‘Theseare women who are ready to use family planning but are unable to; reaching them is the low-hanging fruit,’ Dr Kamran said.
He highlighted the persistent inequity in access. Unmet need stands at 22.5pc among women in the lowest wealth quintile compared with 3.7pc among those in the highest wealth quintile. The model is now being scaled up across 14 districts of Punjab.
Speaking on behalf of UNFPA, Programme Analyst, M&E (SRH), Dr Ghulam Farid Khan, noted that allocations for family planning had increased from approximately Rs20 billion in 2018 to Rs45 billion in 202425, although a significant proportion was absorbed by salaries.