President Museveni believes in a large population

As Uganda joined the rest of the World yesterday Monday June, 11, 2017 to commemorate the World Population Day, authorities have come out to admit that early pregnancies is still one of the most crucial challenges that hinders sustainable development.

Early pregnancy is said to be at 25% and this has stagnated for the last 10 years. This means that in Uganda, one out every four of our teenage girls has had a baby before they reach 19 years.

Government says high teenage pregnancies (24.8%, UDHS 2016), poor sanitation, poverty (19.7, UNHS 2012/13), unemployment (9.4%, UNHS 2012/13), school dropouts, and low universal coverage of immunization against all six killer diseases.

At the national level, it is reported that about 900,000 (15%) of women in the country today were married by the age of 15 years; while about 700,000 (1 in every 4) adolescent girls have either had a child or got pregnant at some point.

Reports also indicate that 134,000 Uganda girls and young women today have been subjected to FMG/C. 68% of adolescent girls between ages 15-19 today have never attended any secondary school.

Furthermore, according to the Uganda Aids Commission (UAC), 66% of all HIV infections are contracted by the adolescent girls. This figure collarets with what is found in reports from districts health facilities and partners working on HIV/Aids issue across the country.

This year’s event was held in Busia district at Madibira Primary School under the theme; “Strengthen Youth Competitiveness for Sustainable Development”.

Teenage Girls Participating in last year’s World Population Day 2016 Uganda – tackling early and forced marriage

The day was designated by the United Nations in 1987 when the total world population hit the five billion mark.

This is an annual event, observed on July 11 by all United Nations members states to raise awareness of population issues like; maternal health, gender equality, poverty alleviation, family planning and youth empowerment.

The function was presided over by President Yoweri Museveni who went on to support the need for a large population for Uganda.

“I am a happy man, because my children and grandchildren have increased. Population increase is good and it is a sign of the good services we are offering. Children are longer dying and we have more people living,” Museveni said.

However, the Netherlands ambassador, Henk Bakker, who was in attendance at the same function had earlier warned of dare consequences in future if Uganda doesn’t check its population.

“If the current growing population is not checked, Uganda will be suffering with a big number of its population uneducated and majority not accessing health services,” Bakker said.

Museveni, however, said, that a huge population is Uganda’s biggest asset that can be used to develop the country.

“The most important asset in Uganda is its people.But you are fighting for gold, oil and other minerals.The wealth of any country is its people, especially when they are educated, healthy, skilled and innovative,” Museveni said.

According to government statistics, there has been a decline in total fertility rate which reduced from 6.9 in 1995 to 5.4 in 2016. Increase in modern contraceptive use from 8% in 1995 to 35% in 2016.

Reports also indicate that there has been a reduction in infant mortality from 81 deaths per 1,000 live births in 1995 to 43 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2016. There has also been a reduction in maternal mortality from 524 deaths per 100,000 live births in 1995 to 338 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2016. Life expectancy has increased from 43 years in 1991 to 63 years.

It is no wonder therefore that this year’s theme was adopted to highlight the challenges that are faced by young people and the need to improve their competitiveness.

Some of the major challenges that still remain are;

Maternal mortality ratio is still a challenge for no woman deserves to die while giving birth and though fertility is reducing, an average of 5.4 children per woman of child bearing age is still high.

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State Minister for Finance David Bahati

Government has urged  Parliament to come up with strategies on  ending teenage pregnancies which it says is  still high among the girl child in Uganda.

The Minister of State for Planning, David Bahati, while presenting a statement during the World Population Day in Kampala said Parliamentarians can play a crucial role in ending the vice through enacting better policies and guidelines.

The event will be celebrated this week on Tuesday in Busia district.

Bahati said that even though the fertility rate among women has slightly reduced, the country still faces a challenge of teenage pregnancies which is standing at 25 percent for the last ten years.

He adds that the most affected girl child are those aged between 11-13 years and wants members of parliament to assist them sensitize the community to ensure girls get pregnant at the age of 19 years

The Opposition Chief Whip,Ibrahim Ssemujju Nganda, on his part urged government to celebrate the function in a national way and avoid their usual partisan stunts.

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Photo credit: Education Uganda

Members of Parliament under the Uganda Parliamentary Forum on Food Security, Population and Development have called for restructuring of the education system to enable youth have enterprising skills. Speaking to journalists ahead of the world population day slated for 11th July the MPs said that the current system has gaps and these gaps should be dealt with accordingly.

They said that the current system creates more job seekers than job makers and therefore there is a need to integrate vocational training into secondary schools. The publicity secretary of the forum Mathias Kasamba said that all school going children should be given an opportunity to have hands on training such that when they leave school at any level they are able to do something. He said that government should ensure that all schools introduce at least 3 craft courses as a way of empowering students.

The Member of Parliament for Kigulu south Milton Muwuma also called on government expand the Social Assistance Grants for Empowerment (SAGE) programme to all the elders across the country. Muwuma said that the program is only supported by the donors and it is in a few districts thus calling upon government to ensure that all districts are covered. He noted that depending on donors leaves the program in balance yet it is a helpful program.

Under SAGE, government pays elderly people in selected districts Shs 25,000 per month. The programme, introduced in 2012, is supported by DFID and is being implemented in 14 districts.

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The secretary General for Uganda Parliamentary Forum for Population and Food Security Mathias Kasamba says that at the end of the year 2012, Uganda’s population will have increased by 3.2%, meaning that the population of Uganda soubles every 20 years.

The Chairperson of Women Parliamentarians and Ministers Sylvia Namabidde says that they disagree with the President’s stance of encouraging parents to give birth to a number of children the way China does it, urging people to only produce children they can give adequate care to.

The Chairperson of Kayunga District Engineer Dagada Steven says Kayunga is still challenged by the high population in the midst of the scarcity of resources.

According to the lastest World reports, the World population is estimated at 7bn people, with Uganda’s population standing at 34,612,250 as per July 2011.

The celebrations are expected to address issues of maternal mortality and reproductive health service accessibility

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“Agriculture is emerging as a solution to mitigating climate change, reducing public health problems and costs, making cities more livable, and creating jobs in a stagnant global economy,” said Danielle Nierenberg, Director of Worldwatch Institute’s Nourishing the Planet project, a two-year evaluation of environmentally sustainable agricultural innovations to alleviate hunger.

This year, the world’s population will hit 7 billion, according to the United Nations. Reaching this unprecedented level of population density has prompted the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) to launch a “7 Billion Actions” campaign to promote individuals and organizations that are using successful new techniques for tackling global development challenges. By sharing these innovations in an open forum, the campaign aims to foster communication and collaboration as our world becomes more populated and increasingly interdependent.

Not even demographers can actually forecast how many people will be added to world population over the coming century, noted Robert Engelman, a population expert and Worldwatch Executive Director. As more women and their partners gain access to reproductive health services and manage their own childbearing, average family size has fallen significantly in recent decades and could continue to do so, assuming expanded support for reproductive health and improvements in women’s autonomy and status. The likelihood of continued population growth for some time, however, remains high. And that will add to the need to harness the ingenuity of human beings to sustain both people and the planet.

“We’ll have to learn how to moderate our consumption of materials and energy and to jumpstart new technologies that conserve them,” Engelman said. Innovations in farming will be among the most important: with planning, agriculture can operate not only as a less-consumptive industry, but also one that works in harmony with the environment.

Researchers with Nourishing the Planet (www.NourishingthePlanet.org) traveled to 25 countries across sub-Saharan Africa to meet with more than 350 farmers groups, NGOs, government agencies, and scientists, highlighting small-scale agricultural efforts that are helping to improve peoples’ livelihoods by providing them with food and income. The findings are documented in the recently released report, State of the World 2011: Innovations that Nourish the Planet.

Nourishing the Planet’s research in Africa has unveiled innovative and cost-effective approaches to agriculture where farmers are treating land as a resource rather than solely as a means for food production. Many of these solutions are scalable and can be adapted to farming systems around the world. “The global connections go beyond Africa. Everyone is in this together in more ways than one,” said Nierenberg.

Nourishing the Planet recommends four ways that agriculture is helping to address the challenges that a growing global population will bring.

·       Urban agriculture for nutritious food and a cooler climate. The U.N. predicts that 65 percent of the global population will live in cities by 2050. Urban agriculture provides an increasing number of city residents with fruits and vegetables, leading to improved nutrition and food security. Urban farms are already gaining popularity around the world, from the Victory Programs’ ReVision Urban Farm in Boston, to Lufa Farms in Montreal, to the slums of Kibera in Nairobi, Kenya.

·       Farming for employment and education. Opportunities in agriculture can reduce poverty and empower a growing population. In Los Angeles county, the organization Farmscape Gardens has helped tackle a 16 percent unemployment rate by hiring workers to establish and maintain edible gardens. To teach the local community about food and agriculture, L.A.’s Fremont High School established a school garden of 1.5 acres that is open to students and the greater community. And in Uganda, project DISC (Developing Innovations in School Cultivation) partnered with Slow Food International to develop 17 school gardens that are used to educate students about growing, harvesting, and preparing nutritious local foods.

·        Agroecology for a healthier environment. Agroecology, which offers numerous benefits to the environment while also feeding people, includes organic agriculture, agroforestry, conservation agriculture, and evergreen agriculture. In Niger, farmers promote the re-greening of dried farmland by allowing spontaneous regeneration of woody species. The restored growth has provided farmers with wind breaks, decreased evaporation, sequestered carbon, and provided non-timber forest products. In the United States, the Environmental Protection Agency has partnered with representatives from metropolitan Washington, D.C. to create the Chesapeake Bay Program watershed partnership. Through collaboration, the group has developed policies, laws, incentives and best practices for farmers whose production zone lies within the local watershed. These agroecological practices, including cover crops, planting riparian forest butters, and practicing conservation tillage, have helped preserve the Bay.

·   Innovations in food waste to make the most of what we have. According to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, industrialized countries waste 222 million tons of food annually, or almost as much as sub-Saharan Africa’s 230 million tons of net food production per year. Decreasing food waste makes it possible to feed people across the planet without increasing agricultural production. In Washington, D.C., the D.C. Central Kitchen Project partners with area restaurants and food suppliers to pick up food that would otherwise go to waste. Volunteers prepare the food and redistribute it as meals to the city’s poor. In central and eastern Africa, a partnership between Bayer Crop Science and the International Potato Center hopes to develop a sweet potato that is resistant to pests and diseases, which are responsible for 50 to 100 percent of crop losses among poor farmers in the region.

State of the World 2011 is accompanied by informational materials including briefing documents, summaries, an innovations database, videos, and podcasts, all available at www.NourishingthePlanet.org. The project’s findings are being disseminated to a wide range of agricultural stakeholders, including government ministries, agricultural policymakers, and farmer and community networks, as well as the increasingly influential nongovernmental environmental and development communities.

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Quality of Population matters

The Uganda Parliamentary Forum on Population and Food security has called upon the government of Uganda to adequately plan for its fast growing population if it is to benefit from the population growth. 

The Woman Member of Parliament for Gulu Betty Aol also a member of the forum has told journalists that now the issues of the big numbers is no longer as important but the fact that such a big and growing population should be well planned for.

The government led by president Yoweri Museveni has been advocating for a higher population citing the increase in market and labour as advantages the country needs.

Aol says she believes Uganda can plan for its population appropriately such that it is a quality population instead of just looking at the advantages of having a big population.

This comes ahead of the world population day that is to be marked on Sunday July 11 2010. In Uganda, the national celebrations will take place in Nebbi under the theme “plan for a quality population because everyone counts”. 

Uganda’s population grows at the rate of 3.2% which is one of the highest population growth rates in the world and currently Uganda’s population is estimated at about 33 million people.

By Ultimate Media

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