The World Population Day observed on July 11 every year has passed rather quietly in this country. But this year's theme "Realising the hopes and aspirations of young people, today and for the future" could not be more relevant for Bangladesh. Already overburdened with an outsize population, the country is now facing a grim prospect of rising total fertility rate (TFR). In plain and simple language, mothers are giving birth to more children than they did in the past decade or so, between 2011 and 2022 to be precise. During this time the average birth rate of a mother was 2.3 children and by 2025, this rate has increased to 2.4 per cent. Notably, this is for the first time that the declining trend in child birth has been reversed in its demographic history of modern times.
Apparently, the 0.1 TFR increase looks innocuous but when it comes to a population of 180 million with 50.6 million women of reproductive age, it unfolds a picture of alarming increase in total population. While persistent narratives focused on demographic dividends, family planning for containing the population growth over the past few years remained grossly neglected. With foreign aid and assistance dwindling, the government of Sheikh Hasina and the interim government made little effort to sustain the gain in population control achieved in the decade before. The interim government, moreover, discontinued the Health, Population and Nutrition Sector Programme (HPNSP) that has served the country well for over two and a half decades.
The programme brought down the population growth from 6.3 per cent in 1975 to 2.3 per cent in 2011. It was a remarkable achievement by any standard. So discontinuation of such a programme is injudicious, particularly when no alternative to this was put in place. Earlier the target was set to bring down the birth rate to 2.1, a cut-off point where the overall population size stabilises. What made the two governments disinterested in such a successful programme is a mystery.
Silently, the country lost the momentum in containing population growth. It was amazingly no longer considered a priority sector. True, foreign funds for population programme were hard to come by but did not quite dry up. After all, here is a problem that demanded an intense focus on it. The two governments should have approached donors in order to convince the latter of the merit of the programme, arguing that it is intrinsically related to the country's poverty eradication and the development objectives. They did not take any such initiative. Neither has the BNP government included this vital issue in its election manifesto. Its predecessors failed to give it the importance it deserved and look for any alternative to carry forward the programme. Non-government organisations (NGOs) working in this field also folded their programmes.
When there was a need for pooling domestic resources in an uncertain time of shrinkage of foreign aid and assistance, the administrations made no move to rein in the population growth. Can the BNP government rethink the matter in the interest of the role population control plays in the overall development of the country? Keeping the population small, unlike other development issues, is basic to realising potential of the various sectors of the country's economy.
Family planning services have to be restored by any means. In its absence, the burgeoning population will pose a threat to food security, healthcare, education, economic stability and social poise. Family planning programmes should be separated from the HPNSP and its infrastructure restored so that the services become robust and effective at the grassroots level. Up to 27 per cent of field-level positions under the Directorate General of Family Planning (DGFP) are vacant now. The vacant positions should be filled up on an emergency basis. There is no alternative to restarting the birth control campaign and restoring the supply chain of contraceptives at the household level.
The aim ought to be to slash the population growth to 2.1 per cent or even to just 2.0 per cent. Incentives like monetary and other rewards may be announced for couples of reproductive age, who limit their children to no more than two or even one. This country has failed to reap dividend of working-age population because of the population pressure on food production, reduced quality in education and healthcare along with a lack of job creation and higher unemployment rates. More people in the country with more 12,000 people now living in per square kilometre will make the matter even worse. Only a reduction in child birth per family can raise the quality of living standard.
In an age of intense competition for food, shelter and other amenities of life, more children to a poor family means a poverty cycle from which the new generation cannot come out. The message to be disseminated should be loud and clear among the poor segments of the population. Field workers of family planning can promote this idea among people at the grassroots level. But first of all, the policymakers and political leaders must be convinced of the merit of launching such a campaign in order to highlight the merit of keeping family size small. Let the country prove that it can restart a vigorous birth control programme from where it was left last time.
nilratanhalder2000@yahoo.com