Sexual and reproductive health and rights and population: an analysis of achievements, gaps and challenges

The ICPD Programme of Action is responsible for a fundamental change in the views and perceptions of policymakers around the world on how population policies and programmes should be formulated and implemented. The POA moved the debate away from a narrow focus on demographic targets and family planning methods towards a more comprehensive approach to sexual and reproductive health. For the first time, member states of the UN recognized reproductive rights as human rights and declared that the principles of gender equality, equity and women’s empowerment were crucial to effective population and development strategies.

In the years since the Programme of Action was adopted, some important steps have been taken to realize the commitments it set out. However, it is painfully clear that progress has been uneven and slow. Despite the change of emphasis and perspective set out at the Cairo ICPD, ministries of health, UN agencies and others have persisted in promoting and implementing narrow, top-down interventions and have ignored commitments to gender equality and equity.

This paper sets out the link between population and human rights and examines how the Cairo Programme of Action, if effectively implemented, would contribute both to the realization of human rights and to better development and population indicators.