Some Experts Question Motives Behind West African Governments’ Pledge To Increase Family Planning Spending To Cut Birth Rates

Quartz: West African governments want to cut population growth in half, but for whose benefit?
“…[O]n July 22, West African politicians took a new and unusual step to curb population growth themselves. At a conference on health and family planning in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, West African parliamentarians committed to allocate five percent of national budgets to family planning programs in order to cut birth rates in the region down to three children per woman by 2030, down from 5.6 children currently. … But it’s never been clear cut that high population growth is really an impediment to development, particularly for Africa…” (Penney, 8/1).

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