The United Nations is highlighting the important role that population trends play in promoting sustainable development, during the annual Commission on Population and Development, which began at UN Headquarters in New York last week.
This year’s Commission is also an opportunity to take stock and review progress made since the landmark International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), which took place 25 years ago in the Egyptian capital, Cairo. The 1994 event resulted in a Programme of Action, based on the idea that investing in individual human rights, capabilities and dignity, is the foundation of all sustainable development.
The Programme was described by the UN as “revolutionary”, because it succeeded in bringing together diverse views on human rights, population, sexual and reproductive health, gender equality and sustainable development, in the search for a global consensus.
