Thoraya Ahmed Obaid
Executive Director
United Nations Population Fund
Wuhan, China
7 September 2004

Minister Zhang Weiqing,
Minister, National Population and Family Planning Commission

Mr. Timothee Gandaho, Executive Director, Partners in Development

Excellencies, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen:

It is my great honour and pleasure to be here in China during the l0th anniversary  of the  International  Conference  on  Population and Development.

I would like to begin by thanking Parters in Development and the National Population and Family Planning Commission of China for organizing this important event and the authorities of Wuhan for their hospitality.

We thank Minister Zhang Weiqing for selecting Wuhan as the venue of this event, not only for the beauty of nature but also to show us a city, which unlike Beijing or Shanghai that are often the center of visitors' attention, provides us with a more realistic view of the social and economic situation of other cities in the country.

We are meeting now to commemorate the tenth anniversary of ICPD. We would not be true to the spirit of ICPD if we do not salute two of the leaders who were visionary and courageous in 1994 and who are with us today:

Dr. Naris Sadik, who was UNFPA Executive Director at that time and who led ICPD in her apacityas Secretary-General of the Conference, a woman of courage and compassion, whose tireless persistence to advocate for the Programme of Action gave it roots in national understanding and programmes.

Fred Sai, the wise doctor from Africa, who spoke and still speaks as the voice of the people. When he speaks, he truly reflects the beatings of the people's heart.

To both of them and to the many others who made ICPD possible, I say, thank you and I hope we and the new generations that will follow us will honour your name and your efforts as we march towards the ICPD goals and the closely linked the MDGs.

Today many partners meet in Wuhan to discuss ways to increase South-South and North-South collaboration and scale up efforts to achieve the goals the ICPD Programme of Action and its essential contribution to meeting the Millennium Development Goals To do so will require very persistent determination as well as innovative and creative planning and implementation.

We start with the recognition that in our world of 6.4 billion people, one billion have 80 per cent of the income and 5 billion have under 20 percent. By 2050 there will be nine billion people on this earth; however this is conditional on how near we reach universal access to reproductive health services by 2015. This a real challenge for all of us is rethink how we will all work together in more effective and non-traditional ways to manage the needs of all these people and how we will create enabling environment for all of them to exercise their human rights, including the right of women and young people to have choices in their lives.

Though I quote these numbers, I know, that the greatest gaps in our world today cannot be quantified by numbers and statistics, but rather by a lack of opportunities and choices, and by a lack of voice and participation. Population is not about numbers, it is about people. This is the great contribution of the Cairo Conference-putting people first.

In many countries  from China to Mexico, from Tunisia to Iran a deep demographic revolution is taking place as families become smaller. This silent revolution has created an unprecedented opportunity to accelerate economic, environmental and social progress. A demographic window has opened, where there are many working age citizens with relatively fewer dependents to support, which allows savings and investment, in households and nations, to expand.

Today, we have much greater understanding than we did ten years ago of a population effect on poverty. We now have solid evidence from dozens of countries that investing in women's empowerment, in education and in reproductive health, including family planning, does reduce poverty on a large scale and does expand human dignity, freedom and opportunity.

Perhaps tile single most important element is that development is about investing in people. Development should not be something, which we as professionals and government officials, dream up and then deliver to poor people. And it is not an export from North to South.

What is essential and what has come out of much experience is that successful programmes are led by the people themselves and are thus built on strengthened local capacities, expertise and culture.

What we need to do is scale up and engage all people who are searching for a better life in the solution to their problems. They know more about what they need and how to go about it. We all can deepen these efforts through technical support, effective infrastructures and systems, focused
capacity building and quality services. But it must be the people, especially youth who will inherit the earth, who should lead the way.

Since Cairo, many lives are better. People are living longer. School enrollment rates are rising. Access to reproductive health services to family planning, antenatal care, skilled attendance at birth and emergency obstetric care  has increased. This is solid progress that is saving and
improving lives.

And yet we see that this progress is uneven and the poorest segments of the population continue to be left behind.  We see that reproductive health continues to elude millions of people due to inadequate levels of knowledge about human sexuality and poor quality reproductive health information and services. Reproductive health continues to be out of reach for many of the world's people because of discriminatory social practices, negative attitudes towards women and girls, and the limited power many women and girls have the social and economic spheres of their lives, including their sexual and reproductive lives.

At the same time, ADS poses an unprecedented threat to development and to human beings and their families. If greater action and an open public attitude are not taken to address HIV/ADS in China, India and other countries, the epidemic could ravage Asia as it has done in Africa.

It is heartening that China, our host country, is taking steps to address HIV/ADS and is beginning to use its extensive reproductive health and family planning networks to spread awareness, information and services to prevent HIV/AIDS. The integration of reproductive health and HIV/AIDS policies and programmes will save lives and money and scale up and speed up most urgent effective response.

And so this Forum is more than just an exchange of ideas. We must go beyond what we've done so often in the past, which is to congratulate ourselves on our successes, to succeed in a project here or a project there. The challenges that we face  to reduce poverty and to ensure universal access to reproductive health and education are just too big. We are not talking about a few clinics or a few people.

We are talking about millions and millions of people. We are talking about giving population and reproductive health a prominent position in national plans and national dialogues, such as PRSP, SWAPs, and health sector reform, debt relief, direct budget support and other such exercises, so that population and reproductive health would get the necessary share of both internal and external resources. We are talking about introducing specific allocations for reproductive health commodities in the budgets of the ministries of health, even in resource poor countries, so that at least most countries can become gradually self-sufficient in availability of reproductive health commodities.

We are gathered here in Wuhan to listen and learn from each other and to take the lessons we learn to scale. Scaling up involves changes in policies and laws, the building of strong institutions and the strengthening of governance. All of these are key factors in economic growth and the provision of public services, and all depend on leadership and commitment. They depend on capacity building and knowledge sharing.

Scaling up also involves raising international assistance and resource flows to levels promised in Cairo and Monterey, and reducing trade barriers and debt, to give poor countries an opportunity to break out of poverty and to invest in people.

UNFPA conducted a global survey to measure progress since Cairo and we found that the vast majority of countries have made policy and legal changes to support reproductive health and rights, and gender equality. The challenge during the coming decade, in the countdown to 2015, is to
put these policies and laws into full practice.

Our Forum here in Wuhan is about creating opportunity and choices that allow people to reach their full potential. It is about social justice and it is about opportunities and hope. And I promise that UNFPA will continue to work with you and support you in the days, months and years to come. Together we should reach the goals set for 2015.

Thank you very much.