UN Population Division, Department of Economic and Social Affairs,
with support from the UN Population Fund (UNFPA)
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| UN Population Division, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, with support from the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) |
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Arab Population Conference Amman 4-8 April 1993. Domestic Features: Young Populations and Rapid Growth National population in the Arab region are expected to double in the next 25-30 years. For countries like Egypt which has 96% of its land as desert, this equates to another 50 million people on only 4% of its land - an enormous challenge for both people and the environment. In comparison, the countries of Western Europe will take more than two centuries to double their populations by natural increases. With a 2.7% annual average, the Arab region is the second fastest growing in the world after Africa, according to U.N. officials in Amman. Recent figures, however, showed a considerable decline in fertility rates over the past thirty years. The number of births per women in the Middle East has dropped from more than 7 children in the 1960s to a level expected to be below 3 by 2025 Despite these significant reductions, the issue of high infant and maternal mortality in the region raised considerable concerns at the Arab Population Conference, which concluded in Amman, Jordan, on 8 April. UNFPA Executive Director, Dr. Nafis Sadik, in her address to the Conference called for the improvement in women's access to better reproductive health care, not only as a means of reducing these high mortality rates, but as "a keystone to the improvement of the status of women" at all levels of society. "The failure of men to take more responsibility for their actions also helps to explain the persistently high level of maternal mortality in the region", added Dr. Sadik. "By allowing women to delay childbirth until they are out of their teens, to space their births, and to stop having children before they became too weak to bear the strains of pregnancy, maternal mortality could be reduced by 40%". Dr. Sadik went a step further by urging men to get directly involved in family planning programmes despite cultural, religious or social reasons that restrain them from doing so. An expanded job market will reduce migration pressures Levels of emigration from Arab countries will depend largely on the ability of these countries to provide jobs for rising numbers of their people entering the work force. This was the clear message heard at the Arab Population Conference. If this is not achieved, substantial migration is seen as one of the few viable alternatives. Pre-adult populations presently account for 40% of the total population of the region, with the vast majority expected to enter the job market in less than a decade. According to a paper submitted to the Conference on Maghreb migration, 24 million Maghrebis will be in the labour market by the year 2000; that figure is expected to rise by almost 50% in 2010 to reach 33 million. "Future emigration from the Maghreb will depend on the development gap between sending countries and the receiving countries, and on the level of economic and population growth in the Maghreb", the report said. Maghrebi migration to Europe, which involves approximately 2 million people, has been regarded as a permanent feature of the region since 1974. Larger numbers still have emigrated to the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (Bahrain, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates). The issue of migration underscores the importance of the close inter-linkages between economic development and population growth. It is certain to be a central theme at the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development, in Cairo The Arab Population Conference was the fourth regional conference to be held in preparation for the ICPD. Jointly organized by the U.N. Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA), the League of Arab States and UNFPA, this five-day meeting, which culminated in a ministerial meeting, focused on the following issues: I) Population Growth and Structure; 2) Population Policies and Programmes; 3)Population, Environment and Development; 4) Population Distribution and Internal Migration; 5~ International Migration; 6) Women and Development; and 7) Family Planning, Health and Family Well-being, The Arab Population Conference concluded with adoption of the Second Amman Declaration on Population and Development. This will constitute an important contribution by the Arab region to the 1994 Conference.