Ten developing countries win support on population

Ten developing countries win support on population

JAKARTA (JP): Ten developing countries yesterday formed a new
forum to jointly address their population problems, with ringing
endorsements from three international funding agencies.

The international partnership on population and development
was forged at the end of the two-day meeting in Jakarta
yesterday.

All 10 countries who were represented -- Bangladesh, Kenya,
Colombia, Mexico, Zimbabwe, Thailand, Tunisia, Morocco, Egypt and
Indonesia -- joined the forum but officials stressed that the
partnership is not an exclusive club and that other countries
would be welcome to join later.

The United Nation Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA), the
Rockefeller Foundation and the Population Council immediately
gave their endorsements to the partnership.

Indonesian State Minister of Population Haryono Suyono, during
a joint press conference, said the support from the three
organizations indicates that developed countries are beginning to
respect the initiatives of developing countries.

He said the forum agreed to ask President Soeharto to promote
the partnership at the forthcoming International Conference on
Population and Development in Cairo, next month.

"The concept of this partnership is really good and we are
open for new members. I hope this partnership will get support
from the (Cairo) conference and more countries will join."

Jyoti S. Singh of the UNFPA hailed the efforts of the ten
countries to seek endorsement from the conference in Cairo.

He said his support for the partnership is in line with the
mission of the UNFPA as it was set up to help developing
countries in population activities.

The idea of forming the partnership was first broached in Bali
in 1992, when Indonesia hosted the Asia Pacific Conference on
Population.

Steve Sinding of the Rockefeller Foundation said he was very
pleased that the initiative has moved so rapidly so as to become
a real commitment of the ten developing countries.

"The Foundation will be very pleased to continue to support
the initiative in any way we can in whatever modest way required
to help. It's clear to me that the initiative is from the
developing countries and the momentum is unstoppable."

`Exiting'

Margaret Cotley of the Population Council, a science and
research organization, said the creation of the partnership marks
an "exiting" development to accelerate the application of science
and research in the field of population.

She gave an example of Indonesia's success on applying implant
contraception which had been developed by her organization. Such
a success story could be disseminated to other developing
countries which have just started to use the contraception.

From the scientific side, she said Indonesia's experience in
implementing the contraception has given her organization a lot
of meaningful information about the contraception, such as its
side effects, its contra-indication, how it would be received by
many different societies and many other scientific aspects.

Mark Cheetaway, who is responsible for Cairo Media Program for
the Partners, said he will conduct a series of media activities,
designed to make sure that the partnership becomes one of the
major news stories of the upcoming population conference in
Cairo.

"We conduct this because President Soeharto has agreed to give
a very high profile from the beginning of the conference, and we
can use that to encourage the newspapers and televisions all over
the world to cover it," he said. (11)