State of World Population 2012 - Country Page List - UNFPA

CHAPTER
FIVE
The costs and savings
of upholding the right
to family planning
To uphold human rights and to reap the benefits of family planning for the
economic and social well-being of individuals, households, communities and
nations, expanding access to family planning is essential. But how much will this
cost Treating family planning as a right has important implications for development
policy and for the sustainable development framework that will in 2015 succeed the
Millennium Development Goals. The normative dimension of human rights
t
Mwanasha, along with
nearly 200 women,
gather under the
shade of a Balboab
tree. They’ve come
for contraceptives,
which for many of
them can save their
lives and transform
their families' futures.
In Malawi, one in 36
women die in childbirth
compared to one in
4,600 in the UK.
©Lindsay Mgbor/
UK Department for
International Development
brings about a radical shift by moving family
planning strategies from the realm of policy
commitment and economic pragmatism to the
realm of obligations and the setting of red flags
in dealing with complex policy tradeoffs.
On the pragmatic economic side, however,
it requires a look at the economic and budgetary
implications of the obligation of equality
and non-discrimination in fiscal and budgetary
policies, for example, the impact of user fees or
taxes on the affordability on contraceptive services.
It also requires a focus on the obligation
of progressive realization over time in relation
to budgetary allocations across sectors as part of
the national budget.
Estimates of the costs have not generally taken
this rights perspective, though they are certainly
not in conflict with it. They have tended to
focus on the demographic characteristics of the
population, its age structure and how this in
combination with unmet need generates numbers
of potential family planning clients.
Growing need
The need for family planning will grow as the
number of people entering their reproductive
years increases in the near future, especially
in the poorest countries. About 15 per cent
of women of reproductive age in developing
countries wish to delay their next birth or cease
childbearing but are not currently using modern
methods of contraception (Singh and Darroch,
2012). Their right to family planning is therefore
at risk.
“Unmet need,” according to the widely
accepted definition, is not as high in richer
countries. Yet “unintendedness” is a term that
applies to a significant proportion of births in
rich and poor countries alike. The lowest rate
of unintendedness is 30 per cent in Western
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