Population Policies and Development Strategies Adviser, Mr. William House, undertook a one-week mission on 27 January - 4 February 1996 to the Solomon Islands. The two major objectives of the mission were to initiate implementation activities for the recently approved project : Assistance to the Design, Coordination and Implementation of the National Population and Development Programme' (SOI/95/PO1) and to collect information and materials relevant to conducting an analytical sectoral review of Population Policies and Development Strategies' in preparation for the next UNFPA Programme Cycle.
As a result of the mission, activities to be undertaken in the near future include: A Population Policy Workshop to engage senior level government officials and NGOs in a policy dialogue to identify the key ingredients of a revised Population and Development Policy; A National Training Workshop for a multi-sectoral audience on the integration of population-related data into the development planning process; and a "Population, Migration and Labour Force Survey" to be designed with a concern to generate scarce data and information on patterns of migration to urban centres, the insertion of migrants, women, youth and children in the urban economy, the linkages between the various kinds of education and vocational training and the rewards from participating in the local economy, and the status of women and gender inequalities in urban labour markets.