Honourable Ministers and Deputy Ministers from SADC Member States
Senior officials from SADC Member States
Africa Region Director of the United Nations Population Fund
Africa Region Director of the Partners in Population and Development
Other Representatives of governments and intergovernmental organisations
Esteemed guests
Ladies and gentlemen
It is a great honour and privilege for me to chair the SADC Ministers' Conference on Population and Development on behalf of the government of South Africa. Let me at the onset welcome you to this country, where the government and its people continue to be an enthusiastic host to all our visitors and strive to provide an enabling environment for important meetings of this nature.
I want to thank and congratulate the officials who serve on the SADC Technical Committee on Population and Development for convening this conference. I also want to thank all the distinguished guests who have travelled to South Africa to attend this conference, to deliberate on many important issues affecting our people in southern Africa.
We have gathered today to achieve the following objectives to:
* consider progress with the implementation of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) Programme of Action in the SADC region
* agree on a resolution on the region's population and development priorities during the next five years, which are also the last five years of the ICPD Programme of Action
* discuss and adopt a regional report, which will reflect the highlights and challenges of implementing the ICPD Programme of Action over the past fifteen years.
The Cairo Conference represented crossroads of sorts, as it marked a turnaround from a perspective of population policies and programmes aimed at controlling population growth, to a perspective of individuals deciding on the size of their family and timing of birth on the basis of information and access to safe, effective, affordable and acceptable methods of family planning of their choice.
Fifteen years after the ICPD, we cannot but rejoice at some of the achievements registered in the area of reproductive health, population and development.
The quality of life in general has improved substantially in the world. We can proudly say that the Cairo agenda has ushered in important changes in many parts of the world, and must indeed be applauded for having been the turning point that has shaped policies and programmes addressing women's and adolescents' sexual and reproductive health and rights, whilst considering many culturally sensitive issues. We note with satisfaction that, over the last fifteen years, reproductive health and rights have been incorporated in an increasing number of governments' policies. We are also glad that Reproductive Health has been added as an additional target at the MDGs+5 review in 2005.
Ladies and gentlemen, South Africa has made good progress in integrating the ICPD's goals into our national policies, though our Population Policy, and particularly in the health, education and social development sectors. As a result, we have been successful in improving certain population and health indicators, as reflected in the SADC ICPD+15 Report, whilst also mitigating the impact of diseases, especially HIV and Aids, on others. Our total fertility rate has dropped to fewer than 2,6 children per woman, as a reflection of the success of our reproductive health services, including maternal health and neonatal care, and the education and general empowerment of women.
As the report indicates, we still share many remaining challenges with other countries in the region, particularly as far as child, infant and maternal mortality is concerned. In these and other areas we are keen to learn from the countries that have been successful in sustaining progress over the past 15 years.
I hope that our activities today will also be the start of a concerted effort to unite our governments, in partnership with civil society, in initiatives to address both the social and economic dimensions of population and development. We have to complement the strides that have been made to date with improved service delivery, to continue to reverse poverty in our countries and to bring us closer to the achievement of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
As we look forward, SADC has an important role to play not only in advocating the urgency of meeting development goals, but also in sharing lessons learned and good practices through partnering and capacity building in development programmes in the region.
I thank you for your attention.
Issued by: Department of Social Development
17 July 2009
