Two hundred million women in the world want to manage the number of children they have but have no access to, or information on, reliable, modern contraceptives. Many of them have never heard of contraceptives. Their options are crossing their fingers or following age-old myths, and the result is more children than they wanted.
Alongside Assefa's personal story, her country, Ethiopia, is now suffering one of the world's worst droughts and food shortages, leaving thousands of people starving, crops failing and further driving families into poverty - families that cannot afford to feed their children. In vulnerable communities such as Assefa's, the threat and effect of climate change is already a fact of life.
This week, the United Nations' Population Fluid issued its 2009 report State of World Population which categorically states that family planning and sexual and reproductive health care can change the course of climate change. The connection between contraception and climate change is clear. Enabling people to control their fertility through information, and access to contraception and thereby giving them what most of its in Australia take for granted – the ability to choose the number of children they have – would undoubtedly slow population growth and dramatically reduce the current demographic and human pressures on the environment which are contributors to climate change. In turn, with more than 95 per cent of the world's population growth occurring in developing countries, contraceptives will help lessen the burden of poverty which will be exacerbated by climate change in these countries.
While the main focus for climate change solutions need to be structured around the largest contributors to greenhouse gases – which are predominantly industrialised nations – a comprehensive policy approach which includes a population focus is also needed. This will ensure that family planning and contraceptives are considered as solutions, with the same vigour as sustainable farming and water conservation, therefore creating communities which can adapt more easily to climate change and also create part of a wider solution.
This is not about controversial population control policies or restricting childbearing for people who want to raise a family. I do not believe that it needs to be. Women the world over want to control the number of babies they have themselves. They want contraception and want a choice. I do believe that they should have access to the health-care services and the education they need to enable them to snake a choice. By providing women with access to contraceptives they are given a basic human right - to decide the size of their family.
It is words such as Assefa's that we hear time and time again in all the countries we work in. Two hundred million women who are not able to exercise the basic human right of deciding how many children they will have. Women who will have children who will die or children they cannot feed, and women who will often stiffer severe health consequences related to their many pregnancies which are too close together. One woman dies every minute from complications related to pregnancy or childbirth and 99 per cent of these deaths occur in the developing world.
These are deaths that can often be prevented by simple family planning. In the lead-tip to the UN's climate change discussions in Copenhagen next month, it's time for all participating government leaders and organisations to be talking of solutions that encompass all contributing factors to the climate change crisis. Contraception can combat climate change.
Written by Eileen Kelly
Published in The Canberra Times, Thursday 19th November 2009
Eileen Kelly is head of advocacy with Marie Stopes International Australia which provides sexual and reproductive health-care services and education.
