Interview: Why sustainable development goals do not include population target?

Understanding population trends will be important for governments striving to meet the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), expected to be adopted by world leaders in September, but the goals do not include specific population targets, John Wilmoth, director of the UN Population Division, told Xinhua in a recent interview.

The 17 SDGs set out targets for all of the world's 193 countries to achieve in areas of economic, social and environmental development, providing a blueprint for global development between 2016 to 2030. They cover areas including eradication of poverty and hunger, gender equality, climate change, oceans and peace.

NO POPULATION OR FERTILITY GOAL

Wilmoth told Xinhua that although there is no specific SDGs goal that relates directly to fertility, sustainable development and population are very closely linked.

"There are no explicit goals with regard to what the level of fertility should be; rather there are goals to support gender equality and to support the provision of services in the areas of sexual and reproductive health," Wilmoth said. "If you address these needs of individuals in the process of population change, then the (population) trends themselves will take care of themselves."

Wilmoth illustrated his argument with examples, including childhood mortality.

"Historically it was true that child mortality was very high -- you know a third of children would die in the first year of life historically and half would never make it to adulthood," he said. "It's shocking to think that there is such a toll."

He explained that this led to parents having more children because they did not know if all of their children would survive to adulthood.

"And, of course, that encouraged people to have high levels of fertility. So gradually over time as children survived more and parents observed this and they realized -- we don't need to have six or seven children in order to have two or three survive to adulthood," he said. "And that fundamentally changes life."

"And so as childhood mortality continues to come down it also continues to reduce the pressure to have high fertility, so in that sense they're very much related," he said.

He also said that other factors such as gender equality and access to sexual and reproductive health services lead to women and men choosing wisely about the number of children that they will have.

WORLD POPULATION TO GROW DESPITE FALLING FERTILITY

The 2015 UN World Population Prospects, released here last week, predicts that world population will continue to grow, hitting 9.7 billion in 2050 and 11.2 billion in 2100. However, the report also acknowledges that globally fertility is decreasing.

"Almost half of the world's population is living in countries with low fertility and yet why is the population then still growing? It's a very reasonable question," Wilmoth said.

The phenomenon is partially explained by high fertility rates in some parts of the world, while in other parts of the world where population has recently dropped, it is explained by population momentum or inertia.

"Part of it relates to the fact that in some parts of the world fertility does remain high," Wilmoth said. "On average across the continent of Africa the total fertility rate is 4.7 babies per woman over her life time, so this still is enough to sustain growth in that part of the world in particular."

Whereas in other parts of the world, population momentum means population has continued to grow even after fertility levels fall, said Wilmoth. "There's like an echo of that rapid growth of the past -- because you have a large population of women of reproductive age who continue then to keep population growth moving along even though fertility has fallen."

Even in China - the population has continued to grow despite a rapid decline in fertility, although Wilmoth said this trend will soon change in the country. "(The population of) China is still growing but it's about to reach a point where it will level off and start to decline," he said.

"It's really historically unprecedented the change which has taken place in China," he added. "Because of the very rapid fall in fertility and then the way that plays itself out, so that now the population is growing older, and population will actually begin to decline in size."

DIFFERENT CHALLENGES, OPPORTUNITIES

The Sustainable Development Goals -- also known as the post- 2015 development agenda -- will also bring about new and different challenges because while in some parts of the world countries will be addressing the needs of a very young population, other countries will be adapting to the needs of an aging population, Wilmoth said.

"So at one extreme we have countries that still have relatively high levels of fertility, that are growing very rapidly, that have very large youth populations," he said. "And in those areas we have to think about how are we going to achieve the goals in terms of education, and health care, and employment, in order to achieve sustainable development."

But he added that young populations are not only a source of development challenges but also of opportunity.

"Large youthful populations are a great resource for countries, but it's also a challenge to develop the government programs and the social structures that make it possible to assure that those children are educated, that their health is protected and that they have opportunities for decent work," he said.

At the other end of the spectrum, many governments are beginning to anticipate the new challenges associated with falling fertility levels and an aging population.

"At the other extreme if you think about populations with very low fertility they are growing more slowly and their populations tend to become much older and these older populations have needs of their own," he said. "The Sustainable Development Goals speak to that in terms of the needs of older people, recognizing older people as a vulnerable group, recognizing their special needs in certain domains such as transport or nutrition."

Meanwhile, Wilmoth also said it is very important for governments to understand population trends as they are expected to work, starting next year, to carry out the SDGs.

"Population trends are in some ways a starting point for the discussion of sustainable development because they kind of define the population and it's needs," Wilmoth said. "Needs are often structured by age, by location, and gender; and so population -- and understanding of population trends -- is very important in order to anticipate the policies that will be necessary to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals." Endite