OMNI
OVER-POPULATION,
GROWTH, SPECIES EXTINCTIONS, HUNGER, CLIMATE CHANGE NEWSLETTER #8,
Compiled
by Dick Bennett for a Culture of Peace, Justice, and Ecology
(#1 July 8, 2010; #2 April
23, 2012; #3 April 4, 2014; #4 June 28, 2014; #5, June 5, 2015; #6, July 16,
2015; #7, Nov. 5, 2015).
See UN World Population
DAY, July 11, 2014 http://omnicenter.org/newsletters/2014/2014-07-11.pdf,
and 2015
What’s at
stake: Reducing population growth and
its catastrophic increase of the human footprint: biodiversity loss/6th
extinction, hunger, meat consumption, affluent overconsumption, CO2, warming, climate
change, melting glaciers, rising seas, weather extremes, droughts, floods.
Overpopulation Newsletter #8
Political Action: Contact
Your Representatives
Family Planning
Organizations
Featured Organizations
Population Connection
Pathfinder International
Family Planning Google
Search
US Teen Pregnancy
PC, It’s Voluntary:
Planning Not Imposed on Other Countries
Monbiot’s Essay on
Population Growth Reviewed by Marion
Starkey of PC
Starkey of PC
Contact Your
Representatives
Dick’s Newsletters, Index,
Blog
Overpopulation Newsletter
#7
Political Action: CONGRESSIONAL
REPORT CARD 2015 by Population Connection Action Fund www.popconnectaction.org. For an electronic version go to www.populationconnectionaction.org/votes
.
Essential for effective political action.
Arkansas’ four House of Representatives and two Senators received a
zero rating. Write them referencing the
individual bills (pp. 3 and 16). See pp.
20-21 for four steadfast congressional supporters of family planning and four
extreme opponents of reproductive health and rights. Write them and your congressional reps too
about them. See at end for Arkansas addresses.
FAMILY PLANNING ORGANIZATIONS
These groups seek to
improve reproductive health and increase women’s choice in family planning by
making contraception easily and universally available for those who choose. As far as I know none makes the connection
with climate change; none promotes their work because it resists global
warming. But population growth means
increased C02 and consumption, and anything that impedes that growth is part of
the Stop Climate Change Movement.
I am working on a
comprehensive, annotated draft list.
Emily’s List
Bill & Melinda Gates
Foundation
CARE
China National Population and Family Planning Commission
Guttmacher Institute
HealthRight
International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF)
NARAL
National Organization for
Women (NOW)
Pathfinder International
Planned Parenthood
Planned Parenthood
Heartland
Planned Parenthood
International
Population Connection
Pro-choice America
Religious Coalition for
Reproductive Choice
Support for
International Family
Planning Organizations (SIFPO)
United Nations Population
Fund (UNFPA)
UN World Health
Organization (WHO)
Women Thrive
FEATURED ORGANIZATIONS
POPULATION CONNECTION
www.populationconnection.org/
Since 1968, Population Connection (formerly Zero Population Growth or ZPG)
has been America's voice for population stabilization. We are the
largest ...
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About Us. ZPG. Since
1968, Population Connection ...
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Population
Education, a program of Population Connection, is the ...
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Employment. Development
Officer, Planned Giving Media ...
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Population
Connection is a national, nonprofit membership ...
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Support Us. A
community-based family planning distribution ...
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Frequently Asked
Questions (FAQ). You don't have to be a ...
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PC has several Arkansas connections: Its Development Director, Shauna Scherer, has
family in Fayetteville. It promotes free
or cheap, long-lasting contraception (LARC).
It invites Arkansas citizens to its annual conference in DC. And contact me for a free subscription to
its excellent magazine.
PATHFINDER INTERNATIONAL
www.pathfinder.org/
Pathfinder International
a non-profit family planning and reproductive
health organization working with developing countries in Latin America, Africa
and Asia.
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Pathfinder's
President & CEO Purnima Mane and Senior Vice ...
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Pathfinder
International is driven by the conviction that all people ...
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Explore Careers.
Working at Pathfinder · Employment ...
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Contact Us. SHARE ...
Please select an office to contact ...
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Board & Staff.
Pathfinder is fortunate to have an incredibly ...
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Pathfinder
International's mission is to ensure that people ...
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I have read Pathfinder’s
outstanding 2015 Annual Report of its work to reduce the 74 million unintended pregnancies
in developing countries every year, which contributes to reducing the 36
million abortions, twenty million of which are unsafe, causing 22 thousand
women to die every year. Although
reducing suffering is their mission, every avoided unintended pregnancy is one less
footprint of biodiversity loss/6th
extinction, hunger, meat consumption, CO2, warming, climate change, melting
glaciers, rising seas, weather extremes, droughts, floods. --Dick
FAMILY PLANNING, Google Search, Nov. 20, 2015
www.unfpa.org/family-planning
United Nations Population Fund
Access to safe, voluntary family planning is a human right. ... Most of these
women with an unmet need for contraceptives live in 69 of the poorest countries
on earth. ... Access to reproductive health, including family planning, is recognized as a human right.
www.who.int/.../family_planning/.../en/
World Health Organization
Family planning: a global handbook for providers. ... Bloomberg School of Public
Health/Center for Communication Programs and World Health Organization.
www.who.int/topics/family_planning/en/
World Health Organization
Family planning: WHO health topic page on family planning provides links to ...Family planning allows individuals and couples to
anticipate and attain their desired ... information and services · Family planning: a global handbook for providers.
www.pathfinder.org/
Pathfinder International
a non-profit family planning and reproductive health organization working with developing countries in Latin America, Africa
and Asia.
www.psi.org › ... › Projects
Population Services International
Support for International Family Planning Organizations (SIFPO) ... Strengthen gender-sensitive
and youth friendly family planning services at the global level.
www.gatesfoundation.org/.../Global.../F...
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Family planning is a smart, sensible, and vital
component of global health and ... civil society organizations, foundations, and the private sector to
commit to ...
kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/.../organizations-working-on-f...
Nicholas Kristof
Apr 7, 2009 - Organizations working on family planning ... and global access to reproductive health care and family planning options. http://www.feminist.org.
The U.S. Government and International Family Planning ...kff.org/global.../the-u-s-government-and-inter...
Kaiser Family Foundation
Apr 23, 2015 - Figure 1: U.S. Government Global Family Planning/Reproductive Health ... provided through the
International Organizations & Programs (IO&P) ...
https://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/.../gpr160418.html
Guttmacher Institute
by S Barot - 2013 - Cited by 1 - Related articles
On the global level, many faith-based organizations (FBOs) have had a long ... This history,
their commitment to family planning as part of their development ...
www.ippf.org/
Those services include family planning, abortion, maternal and child health, and STI
... A global youth movement for sexual rights by The
International Planned ...
Adwww.non-daily-birthcontrol.com/
Learn About Non-Daily Options For Birth
Control. Find More Info.
Searches related to family planning organizations
global
TEEN PREGNANCY USA
“Youth Health Programs.” Free Mind (Winter 2015, p. 9) (American Humanist Association). In US 1 in 4 teens get pregnant by age 20. Report on coalition of over 100 organizations calling on Congress to fund programs adequately “that advance the lifelong health of our nation’s youth” and to “eliminate funding for harmful abstinence only education.”
“Youth Health Programs.” Free Mind (Winter 2015, p. 9) (American Humanist Association). In US 1 in 4 teens get pregnant by age 20. Report on coalition of over 100 organizations calling on Congress to fund programs adequately “that advance the lifelong health of our nation’s youth” and to “eliminate funding for harmful abstinence only education.”
Is the U.S. imposing its own values about reproductive health and family planning on other countries? Should anyone fear family planning ideas and practices as prejudicial to colored people in economically stressed countries?
Not
at all. The U.S. generally
provides assistance to other countries through two avenues: the United Nations
Population Fund (UNFPA) and the United States Agency for International
Development (USAID).
UNFPA assists governments and organizations at
the receiving countries’ request. The agency maintains a democratically
organized and implemented agenda, agreed upon by the 179 countries that took
part in the Cairo International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD)
in 1994. UNFPA extends assistance to countries at their request and
works in partnership with governments, all parts of the United Nations system,
development banks, bilateral aid agencies, non-governmental organizations, and
civil society. Under internationally agreed upon population and development
goals, each country decides for itself what approach to take in order to meet
the specific needs of its residents. At the Cairo conference, developing
countries agreed to provide 75% of the funding needed to provide family
planning to everyone who wants to use it in their countries, and the
industrialized nations agreed to provide the remaining 25% of the funding.
USAID grants assistance to foreign
organizations that apply for funding and technical assistance. There is no U.S.
funding for family planning in any country where it is not specifically
requested by either the government or a local organization. (From
Population Connection) . Additional comment by Shauna Schere of PC: Basically, we’re advocating that the U.S.
government increase the foreign aid it contributes to international family
planning programs through USAID and UNFPA, so that the 225 million women
worldwide with “unmet need” for family planning can gain access. Unmet need
means that they are of childbearing age and want to use contraceptives, but
cannot obtain them. We simply want to empower women to make the best decisions
for themselves—that’s true around the world, and it’s true right here in the
U.S.!
REVIEW OF MONBIOT’S ESSAY ON POPULATION GROWTH BY MARIAN STARKEY
Monbiot.com
GEORGE MONBIOT, It’s the Rich Wot Gets the
Pleasure
27 Oct 2011 Population is much less of a problem than
consumption. No wonder the rich are obsessed by it. By George Monbiot. Published on the Guardian’s website, 27th October 2011 It must
rank among the most remarkable events in recent human history. In just 60 years
the global average number of children each woman bears has fallen from 6 to
2.5. This is an astonishing triumph for women’s empowerment, and whatever your
position on population growth might be, it is something we should celebrate.
But this decline in fertility, according to the report the United Nations
published yesterday, is not the end of the story. It has now raised its
estimate of global population growth. Rather than peaking at about 9 billion in
the middle of this century, the UN says that human numbers will reach some 10 billion by 2100, and continue
growing beyond that point. That’s the middle scenario. The highest of its range
of estimates is an astonishing 15.8bn by 2100. If this were correct, population
would be a much greater problem – for both the environment and human
development – than we had assumed. It would oblige me to change my views on yet
another subject. But fortunately for my peace of mind and, rather more
importantly, for the prospects of everyone on earth, it is almost certainly
baloney. Writing in the journal Nature in May, Fred Pearce pointed out that the
UN’s revision arose not from any scientific research or analysis, but from what
appeared to be an arbitrary decision to change one of the inputs it fed into
its model. Its previous analysis was based on the assumption that the average
number of children per woman would fall to 1.85 worldwide by 2100. But this
year it changed the assumption to 2.1. This happens to be the population
replacement rate: the point at which reproduction contributes to neither a fall
nor a rise in the number of people. The UN failed to explain this changed
assumption, which appears to fly in the face of current trends, or to show why
fertility decline should suddenly stop when it hit replacement level, rather
than continuing beyond that point, as has happened to date in all such
populations. I expected yesterday’s report to contain the explanation. I
expected wrong. It appears to have plucked its fertility figure out of the air.
Even so, and even if we’re to assume that the old figures are more realistic
than the new ones, there’s a problem. As the new report points out “the escape
from poverty and hunger is made more difficult by rapid population growth.” It
also adds to the pressure on the biosphere. But how big a problem is it? If you
believe the rich, elderly white men who dominate the population debate, it is
the biggest one of all. In 2009 for example, a group of US billionaires met to
decide which threat to the planet most urgently required their attention. Who’d
have guessed? These men, who probably each consume as many of the world’s
resources in half an hour as the average African consumes in a lifetime,
decided that it was population. Population is the issue you blame if you can’t
admit to your own impacts: it’s not us consuming, it’s those brown people
reproducing. It seems to be a reliable rule of environmental politics that the
richer you are, the more likely you are to place population growth close to the
top of the list of crimes against the planet. The new report, inflated though
its figures seem to be, will gravely disappoint the population obsessives. It
cites Paul Murtaugh of Oregon State University, whose research shows that: “An
extra child born today in the United States, would, down the generations,
produce an eventual carbon footprint seven times that of an extra child in
China, 55 times that of an Indian child or 86 times that of a Nigerian
child.”And it draws on a paper published in the Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences which makes the first comprehensive assessment of how
changes in population affect carbon dioxide emissions. This concludes that:
“slowing population growth could provide 16 per cent to 19 per cent of the
emissions reductions suggested to be necessary by 2050 to avoid dangerous
climate change”. In other words, it can make a contribution. But the other
81-84% will have to come from reducing consumption and changing technologies. The
UN report concludes that “even if zero population growth were achieved, that
would barely touch the climate problem.”This should not prevent us from
strongly supporting the policies which will cause population to peak sooner
rather than later. Sex education, the report shows, is crucial, so is access to
contraception and the recognition of women’s rights and improvement in their
social status. All these have been important factors in the demographic
transition the world has seen so far. We should also press for a better
distribution of wealth: escaping from grinding poverty is another of the
factors which has allowed women to have fewer children. The highly unequal
system sustained by the rich white men who fulminate about population is one of
the major reasons for population growth. All this puts conservatives in a
difficult position. They want to blame the poor for the environmental crisis by
attributing it to population growth. Yet some of them oppose all the measures –
better and earlier sex education, universal access to contraception (for
teenagers among others), stronger rights for women, the redistribution of
wealth – which are likely to reduce it. And beyond these interventions, what do
they intend to do about population growth? As the UN report points out:
“Considerable population growth continues today because of the high numbers of
births in the 1950s and 1960s, which have resulted in larger base populations
with millions of young people reaching their reproductive years over succeeding
generations.”In other words, it’s a hangover from an earlier period. It has
been compounded by another astonishing transformation: since the 1950s, global
life expectancy has risen from 48 to 68. What this means is that even if all
the measures I’ve mentioned here – education, contraception, rights,
redistribution – were widely deployed today, there will still be a population
bulge, as a result of the momentum generated 60 years ago. So what do they
propose? Compulsory sterilisation? Mass killing? If not, they had better
explain their programme. Yes, population growth contributes to environmental
problems. No, it is not the decisive factor. Even the availability of grain is
affected more by rising livestock numbers and the use of biofuels – driven,
again by consumption – than by human population growth. Of course we should
demand that governments help women regain control over their bodies. But beyond
that there’s little that can be done. We must instead decide how best to
accommodate human numbers which will, at least for the next four decades,
continue to rise. www.monbiot.com
REPLY TO MONBIOT BY MARIAN STARKEY,
POPULATION CONNECTION, 11-2-15
Rather than peaking at about 9 billion in the middle of this
century, the UN says that human numbers will reach some 10 billion by 2100, and
continue growing beyond that point.
That’s the middle scenario. The highest of its range of estimates
is an astonishing 15.8bn by 2100. If this were correct, population would be a
much greater problem – for both the environment and human development – than we
had assumed. It would oblige me to change my views on yet another subject. But
fortunately for my peace of mind and, rather more importantly, for the
prospects of everyone on earth, it is almost certainly baloney.
·
The UN Population Division
updates its projections every two years, using the most recent demographic data
(census and Demographic and Health Survey)
available for each country. Sometimes new data forces them to revise their
population estimates for the base years from which the new projections are
formed. Sometimes fertility rates haven’t declined as much as they were
projected to do, so numbers are revised upwards. That is what happened with
this latest revision of the UN World
Population Prospects, and also what happened in the 2010 revision that
Monbiot references.
Writing in the journal Nature in May, Fred Pearce pointed out that
the UN’s revision arose not from any scientific research or analysis, but from
what appeared to be an arbitrary decision to change one of the inputs it fed
into its model. Its previous analysis was based on the assumption that the
average number of children per woman would fall to 1.85 worldwide by 2100. But
this year it changed the assumption to 2.1. … The UN failed to explain this
changed assumption, which appears to fly in the face of current trends, or to
show why fertility decline should suddenly stop when it hit replacement level,
rather than continuing beyond that point, as has happened to date in all such
populations. I expected yesterday’s report to contain the explanation. I
expected wrong. It appears to have plucked its fertility figure out of the air.
·
The UN revised its future fertility
assumptions based on the much slower rate of fertility decline that they have
observed through new demographic data in the past several years, compared to
how quickly they had previously projected that it would decline.
·
In a way, all of the assumptions
the UN or any other agency makes about future population trends are “plucked
out of the air.” Nobody knows what will happen in the future, so we have to
make educated guesses. The UN is no different than any other agency that does
projections—they use the best data available to make the best educated guesses
and then they let the model do the rest of the work.
In 2009 for example, a group of US billionaires met to decide
which threat to the planet most urgently required their attention. Who’d have
guessed? These men, who probably each consume as many of the world’s resources
in half an hour as the average African consumes in a lifetime, decided that it
was population.
·
Population growth isn’t a problem
only for environmental reasons. It has serious consequences for women’s rights
and equality, girls education, health, and economic development.
It seems to be a reliable rule of environmental politics that the
richer you are, the more likely you are to place population growth close to the
top of the list of crimes against the planet.
·
Most population activists would
agree that rapid population growth in the poorest countries does not affect
those of us who live in the industrialized world (except through immigration),
especially in terms of environmental degradation. The linkages between rapid
population growth and environmental harm are much more localized than that.
“An extra child born today in the United States, would, down the
generations, produce an eventual carbon footprint seven times that of an extra
child in China, 55 times that of an Indian child or 86 times that of a Nigerian
child.”
·
Probably true. Again, though, this
movement is not about slowing population growth in the developing world in
order to save the environment in the developed world. It’s about helping
communities in the poorest regions protect their own environments, grow
economically, rise out of poverty at the household level, and improve women’s
and children’s health.
“slowing population growth could provide 16 per cent to 19 per
cent of the emissions reductions suggested to be necessary by 2050 to avoid
dangerous climate change”.
In other words, it can make a contribution. But the other 81-84%
will have to come from reducing consumption and changing technologies.
·
Agreed. All population
stabilization advocates I know believe that slowing population growth is just
one “wedge” in solving the
climate change puzzle. It is important and needs to be considered, but on its
own it won’t stop climate change or fix the damage already done.
All this puts conservatives in a difficult position. They want to
blame the poor for the environmental crisis by attributing it to population
growth. Yet some of them oppose all the measures – better and earlier sex
education, universal access to contraception (for teenagers among others),
stronger rights for women, the redistribution of wealth – which are likely to
reduce it.
·
I can’t think of any conservatives
who blame environmental crises on population growth. Maybe 30 years ago, but
not now. In fact, conservatives are wont to acknowledge that the environment is
suffering at all in the first place.
“Considerable population growth continues today because of the high
numbers of births in the 1950s and 1960s, which have resulted in larger base
populations with millions of young people reaching their reproductive years
over succeeding generations.”
In other words, it’s a hangover from an earlier period. It has
been compounded by another astonishing transformation: since the 1950s, global
life expectancy has risen from 48 to 68.
·
This is true of countries such as
the United States, where the TFR has been at or below replacement rate since
the 1970s but the population has continued to grow. It is not, however, the
reason that population is continuing to grow at such a rapid pace in the
poorest, least developed countries. There, it is growing because of very high
fertility that persists today.
What this means is that even if all the measures I’ve mentioned
here – education, contraception, rights, redistribution – were widely deployed
today, there will still be a population bulge, as a result of the momentum
generated 60 years ago.
·
Correct
So what do they propose? Compulsory sterilisation? Mass killing?
If not, they had better explain their programme.
·
No. We propose doing the things he
mentioned above (education, contraception, rights, redistribution) and coping
with the growth while momentum plays out. Obviously. And this is exactly how
our group views the situation in the United States—we are still growing because
of momentum and because of immigration. Add to that the high rate of unplanned
births (1/3 of all births in the U.S.) and we’ve still got a lot of work to do in
the measures we all agree are important and necessary.
Even the availability of grain is affected more by
rising livestock numbers and the use of biofuels
– driven, again by consumption – than by human population growth.
·
Rising numbers of livestock are a
direct response to rising numbers of people who want to eat meat. Consumption
can’t be separated completely from population growth—more people consume more
things: food, water, trees (wood), etc.
Of course we should demand that governments help women regain
control over their bodies. But beyond that there’s little that can be done.
·
That is what Population Connection
does—we don’t lobby on environmental issues; we lobby on reproductive health.
We must instead decide how best to accommodate human numbers which
will, at least for the next four decades, continue to rise.
·
Agreed, except for his use of the
word “instead.” Population Connection believes that we need to do both: accept that
the population is going to continue to grow for some decades, even if fertility
rates decline significantly; AND expand access to sex education and birth
control so that the population will peak at the earliest date, rather than
continuing to grow well into the next century. These are not mutually exclusive
responses to the situation.
CONTACT
ARKANSAS REPRESENTATIVES
Senator John
Boozman:
(202)224-4843
Senator Tom
Cotton:
(202)224-2353
Rep. Rick Crawford, 1st District: (202)225-4076
Rep. French Hill, 2nd District: (202)225-2506
Rep. Steve Womack, 3rd District: (202)225-4301
1119 Longworth
House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Washington, DC 20515
3333
Pinnacle Hills, Suite 120
Rogers, Arkansas 72758
Rogers, Arkansas 72758
Rep. Bruce Westerman, 4th District: (202) 225-3772
DICK’S BLOGS, NEWSLETTERS, INDEX
Blog: It’s the War Department
Blog: It’s the War Department
Newsletters
http://omnicenter.org/dick-bennetts-peace-justice-and-ecology-newsletters/
Index :
http://omnicenter.org/dick-bennetts-peace-justice-and-ecology-newsletters/dicks-newsletter-index/
Index :
http://omnicenter.org/dick-bennetts-peace-justice-and-ecology-newsletters/dicks-newsletter-index/
See: abortion.doc, OMNI
Climate Change Forums. doc, Planned Parenthood, OMNI Population Poverty Hunger
Watch.doc (these should be one with OMNI population warming watch.doc), Population
Organizations, Sierra Club Population Project, Worldwatch
Institute , OneWorld US,
Population Action International, United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA)
Contents Overpopulation Newsletter #7
PREVENTION, CHOICE
World Contraception Day, September 26, 2015
McClain, Long-Acting
Contraception
Endangered Species Condoms
Men Are Responsible
Too: World Vasectomy Day,
November 13, 2015
Katha Pollitt, Population density affects everything: Women
Must Have Power Over Their Fertility
Must Have Power Over Their Fertility
POPULATION GROWTH:
BIODIVERSITY LOSS, HUNGER, COLLAPSE
Geiling, Population Growth
Causes Biodiversity Loss
Population Growth Produces
Hungry People
Speth and Diamond:
Planetary Collapse from Population Growth
Weisman, Countdown: 2 Reviews
PLANNING, PREVENTION,
CHOICE ORGANIZATIONS
UNFPA
Pathfinder International
Planned Parenthood
International Federation
Population Action
International
Population Connection
Action Fund
END OVERPOPULATION NEWSLETTER #8
