CONCEPT 6-4 135
One of the conference’s goals was to encourage action
to stabilize the world’s population at 7.8 billion by 2050
instead of the projected 9.2 billion.
The experiences of countries such as Japan, Thai-
land, South Korea, Taiwan, Iran, and China show that
a country can achieve or come close to replacement-
level fertility within a decade or two. Such experiences
also suggest that the best ways to slow and stabilize
population growth are through investing in family plan-
ning, reducing poverty, and elevating the social and economic
status of women (Concept 6-4).
Empowering Women Can Slow
Population Growth
Studies show that women tend to have fewer chil-
dren if they are educated, hold a paying job outside the
home, and live in societies where their human rights
are not suppressed. Although women make up roughly
half of the world’s population, in most societies they
do not have the same rights and educational and eco-
nomic opportunities as men do.
Women do almost all of the world’s domestic work
and child care for little or no pay and provide more
unpaid health care than all of the world’s organized
health services combined. They also do 60–80% of
the work associated with growing food, gathering and
hauling wood (Figure 6-13) and animal dung for use
as fuel, and hauling water in rural areas of Africa, Latin
America, and Asia. As one Brazilian woman put it, “For
poor women the only holiday is when you are asleep.”
Globally, women account for two-thirds of all hours
worked but receive only 10% of the world’s income,
and they own less than 2% of the world’s land. Also,
about 70% of the world’s poor and 64% of all 800 mil-
lion illiterate adults are women.
Because sons are more valued than daughters in
many societies, girls are often kept at home to work in-
stead of being sent to school. Globally, some 900 mil-
lion girls—three times the entire U.S. population—do
not attend elementary school. Teaching women to read
has a major impact on fertility rates and population
growth. Poor women who cannot read often have five
to seven children, compared to two or fewer in societies
where almost all women can read.
According to Thorya Obaid, executive director of
the U.N. Population Fund, “Many women in the devel-
oping world are trapped in poverty by illiteracy, poor
health, and unwanted high fertility. All of these con-
tribute to environmental degradation and tighten the
grip of poverty.”
An increasing number of women in developing
countries are taking charge of their lives and repro-
ductive behavior. As it expands, such bottom-up
change by individual women will play an important
role in stabilizing population and reducing environ-
mental degradation.■ CASE STUDY
Slowing Population Growth
in China: The One-Child Policy
China has made impressive efforts to feed its people,
bring its population growth under control, and encour-
age economic growth. Between 1972 and 2008, the
country cut its crude birth rate in half and trimmed itsFigure 6-13 Women from a village in
the West African country of Burkina
Faso returning with fuelwood. Typically
they spend 2 hours a day two or three
times a week searching for and hauling
Mark Edwards/Peter Arnold, Inc.fuelwood.