The global targets, that are a part of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), are to (i) achieve universal access to family planning services - that is unmet need for family planning should decline to zero by 2030, and (ii) reduce global maternal mortality rate to less than 70 per 100,000 live births by 2030. Achieving these targets will not only contribute to good health and wellbeing for women and girls but also lead to gender equality.
But perhaps it might be more realistic to achieve the goal of reducing unmet need of family planning to 10% instead of zero by 2030, feels Dr Adrian Hayes, Honorary Associate Professor, School of Demography at Australian National University. He shares some interesting data on these two indicators for some countries of the Asia Pacific region: "As per estimates of UN Population Division, the unmet need for family planning target of 10% has already been reached by some countries of the region including China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea, Iran, New Zealand, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam. But others have still a long way to go. In South Asia, only Bangladesh is expected to reach the 10% threshold by 2030, while Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nepal, India, and Maldives are likely to miss it and remain around 20%. Similarly, in South-East Asia, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines and Myanmar appear likely to just miss the 10% target by 2030. In the Pacific Islands there are many countries with higher unmet need at 20% or more in 2020."
Then again, at least 12 countries of the region currently have high maternal mortality rates of 120 or more, with Afghanistan topping the list at 638, followed by Myanmar (250), Bhutan (183), Bangladesh (173), Nepal (186), Laos (185), Indonesia (177), Cambodia (160), India (145), Papua New Guinea (145), Timor Leste (142), Pakistan (140) and Philippines (121).
However, Japan, South Korea, Singapore and New Zealand boast of having the lowest maternal mortality rates of 15 or less for the last 20 years. Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam China, Mongolia, Fiji and Samoa too have reached maternal mortality rates of less than 70.
So while progress has been fairly good on these two indicators in some countries of the region, programmes in few South-East Asian countries need a dose of revitalisation to realise them by 2030. However, many countries in South Asia and the Pacific need major reforms in policies and programmes to make family planning services accessible to all women and to also reduce maternal mortality.
Biplabi rues that though sexual and reproductive health and rights and gender find a place in international agreements, there are no accountability frameworks within them to ensure that countries respect, protect and fulfil their commitments to basic human rights, which get further violated in times of crisis. There is lack or absence of gender mainstreaming and sexual and reproductive health and rights in most countries' climate-related policies and programmes. Women are made invisible in environment and climate-related discourses. This again perpetuates the vicious cycle of inequality for women and girls.
Noelene Nabulivou, co-founder of Diverse Voices and Action for Equality (DIVA) stresses upon the important linkages between sexual and reproductive health and rights and climate change, between disaster risk and response and elimination of violence against women and protection of LGBTQI human rights. She says that sexual and reproductive health and rights are central to any development response to pandemics (like COVID-19) and all natural calamities like floods and cyclones, because it is the body where the damage and human rights violations are felt most.
All said and done, there is a very clear linkage between climate change and sexual and reproductive health and rights but it is often neglected. For Adrian "the response to climate change should be rooted in sustainable ways. We cannot achieve the SDGs without resolving the looming crisis of climate change. Also as sexual and reproductive health and rights are an essential component of sustainable development, they are directly impacted by climate change."
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