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Via Population Council - http://www.popcouncil.org/
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Examining the Data - Challenges for
Women & Girls-Inequities Between Women & Men, Between the Rich &
the Poor, Between Countries-Asia
UNFPA's State of World Population 2010 and UNDP's Human
Development Report 2010 were recently released, and there is good and bad
news for Asia.
The good news is that women are giving birth to
fewer children, babies born in most countries survive to celebrate their first
birthday and indeed can expect to live longer than any time in history, and
contraceptive use is as comparable to the developed world. With a young
population, and thus a large number in the productive compared to the dependent
ages, Asia is in an
ideal position to reap the demographic dividend. And its economic boom is its
crowning glory.
But there is bad news too. Asia's averages are misleading, and conveniently
cover up the inequities that persist within countries, between regions, between
rich and poor, and between men and women. Many parts of Asia have been barely
touched by the economic boom, children continue to be undernourished and poorly
educated; women continue to deliver babies in their homes, and when they are
teenagers; motherhood continues to be a death trap for many. Three disparities
drive home the inequities.
First, maternal mortality has fallen impressively, but when we know that almost
all maternal deaths are preventable, 330 is hardly an acceptable maternal
mortality ratio. Regional disparities are glaring: the UNFPA report
highlights that 660 maternal deaths occur per 1,00,000 live births in Laos, 540 in Cambodia, and 450
in India; fewer than half report skilled attendance at delivery.
Disparities between rich and poor are just as stark. Poor women resist
delivering in hospitals, fearing hidden costs, disrespectful providers and
unhygienic conditions. One of the women we surveyed told us about her
daughter-in-law, who died giving birth in India. Recounting the incident she
said, "The doctor asked us to personally arrange for blood and some
medicine, but it took time and she died before we could." Distance,
limited access to blood and supplies, poverty, and physician apathy cost this
woman her life. She is not the only one.
Children continue to give birth to children: for every 1,000 adolescent girls,
101 in Nepal, 72 in Bangladesh and
68 in India have
already given birth. We know that when girls become pregnant before their
bodies and minds are ready to take on the tasks of adulthood, it exposes them
and their babies to huge health risks.
Second, although Asia is in a position to harness the demographic dividend,
this will not happen without a youth population that is educated, skilled,
employed and healthy. Unfortunately, this is not the case in many settings. In
Bangladesh, Myanmar,
India, Laos, Nepal
and Pakistan,
for example, just between one-third and half of girls are in secondary school,
a minimum requirement for entering the workforce. Moreover, the demographic
dividend does not last forever. Today's youth will be tomorrow's older, less
productive dependents. Asia as a whole is simply not ready to reap the
demographic dividend.
And finally, the attainment of reproductive rights is unfulfilled. The
reproductive rights of women and men continue to be violated in many parts of
Asia. Child marriage, outlawed by international conventions, persists in South
Asia; in Bangladesh for example, almost four in 10 young women were married
before they were 15.
The right to information has been repeatedly violated: sex education is
provided in very few countries and, where it is provided, teachers are
uncomfortable and the curriculum is so technical that it fails to educate and
protect the young. A study in India found that two in five young men and women
believed that a woman cannot become pregnant the first time she has sex. No
knowledge equals no protection.
The huge unmet need for family planning is yet another telling indicator of how
far Asia is from ensuring that couples are able to determine the number and
spacing of their children. Inequity in a woman's ability to ensure that all her
pregnancies are wanted persist: in Cambodia, Nepal and Pakistan, for example,
almost one in three women from the poorest households had an unmet need for
contraception, compared to one-fifth or fewer in better off households.
The rights of women and girls are taken away even before they are born by the
practice of prenatal sex
determination and abortion of female foetuses, a practice that has skewed
the sex ratio of populations of many Asian countries. Within marriage and
partnerships, women have little say in sexual relations and sexual and physical
violence characterises many relationships. And the ability to make decisions
and control money and even the freedom to move around their villages eludes
many women. Asia has no doubt come a long way from the days of widespread
poverty, but as the Human Development Report 2010 emphasises, human development
is different from economic growth. Conversely, as we in Asia are experiencing,
fast economic growth is not always accompanied by parallel achievements
in human development. Asia's progress cannot be measured by its economic
laurels, but by the quality of life of each its 4.2 billion citizens.
Governments, donors and civil societies should not be lulled into complacency
by the rosy economic picture.