FE Report

Bangladesh has achieved remarkable success in population control programme, claimed Health Minister AFM Ruhal Haque Thursday.

Referring to the recent report published in the Economist, he reiterated Bangladesh is in the right track in bringing down the population growth rate and the target for population control by 2015 is reasonable.

He made the remarks while briefing the journalists at the secretariat on the two-day international conference on population and development to be held on 10 and 11 November at a city hotel.

Health ministry in collaboration with Partners in Population and Development (PPD), an inter-governmental organisation promoting South-South Cooperation, organised the press conference on 'Evidence to Action: South- South Collaboration for ICPD Beyond 2014'.

Ruhal Haque said the cooperation of PPD has much influence in various population control activities of Bangladesh alongside other programmes.

"Today we have reduced the population growth rate to 1.37 per cent and the contraceptive prevalence rate (CPR) is 61.2 per cent. At present maternal mortality rate is 194 or 40 per cent less than the previous 322," said Ruhal Haque.

"Visibly population control is poor but the achievement in terms of unmet need and availability of manpower is beyond my expectation," said the minister.

Regarding the objective of the conference he said the 25 developing countries which will attend the conference represent 57 per cent of the world population. Bangladesh has achieved phenomenal progress in population and other sectors which is recognised by the global authorities and also won the South-South Award, he added.

Health secretary Humayun Kabir and PPD secretary Boniface o K'oyugi were also present during the press briefing.

Boniface said the developing nations want to reduce their dependence on the technology of the developed countries for controlling their population.

Through the conference all the PPD member countries will get benefit from networking, knowledge and experience sharing and technology exchange in population control, he cited.

He said one of the major issues of the population control is gender equality and empowerment of women.

"The whole idea is to improve the quality of life and focus on the reproductive health to ensure that," Boniface said.

The conference will conclude through a Dhaka Declaration on November 11.