World fertility rates in 'unprecedented decline', UN says
Namrata Nangia and her husband have been toying with the idea of having another child since their five-year-old daughter was born.
But it always comes back to one question: 'Can we afford it?'
She lives in Mumbai and works in pharmaceuticals, her husband works at a tyre company. But the costs of having one child are already overwhelming - school fees, the school bus, swimming lessons, even going to the GP is expensive.
It was different when Namrata was growing up. "We just used to go to school, nothing extracurricular, but now you have to send your kid to swimming, you have to send them to drawing, you have to see what else they can do."
According to a new report by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the UN agency for reproductive rights, Namrata's situation is becoming a global norm.
The agency has taken its strongest line yet on fertility decline, warning that hundreds of millions of people are not able to have the number of children they want, citing the prohibitive cost of parenthood and the lack of a suitable partner as some of the reasons.
UNFPA surveyed 14,000 people in 14 countries about their fertility intentions. One in five said they haven't had or expect they won't have their desired number of children.
The countries surveyed - South Korea, Thailand, Italy, Hungary, Germany, Sweden, Brazil, Mexico, US, India, Indonesia, Morocco, South Africa, and Nigeria - account for a third of the global population.
They are a mix of low, middle and high-income countries and those with low and high fertility. UNFPA surveyed young adults and those past their reproductive years.
"The world has begun an unprecedented decline in fertility rates," says Dr Natalia Kanem, head of UNFPA.
"Most people surveyed want two or more children. Fertility rates are falling in large part because many feel unable to create the families they want. And that is the real crisis," she says.
How should countries deal with falling birth rates?
Why a nation of 1.45 billion wants more children
The influencers who want the world to have more babies - and say the White House is on their side
"Calling this a crisis, saying it's real. That's a shift I think," says demographer Anna Rotkirch, who has researched fertility intentions in Europe and advises the Finnish government on population policy.
"Overall, there's more undershooting than overshooting of fertility ideals," she says. She has studied this at length in Europe and is interested to see it reflected at a global level.
She was also surprised by how many respondents over 50 (31%) said they had fewer children than they wanted.
The survey, which is a pilot for research in 50 countries later this year, is limited in its scope. When it comes to age groups within countries for example, the sample sizes are too small to make conclusions.
But some findings are clear.
In all countries, 39% of people said financial limitations prevented them from having a child.
The highest response was in Korea (58%), the lowest in Sweden (19%).
In total, only 12% of people cited infertility - or difficulty conceiving - as a reason for not having the number of children they wanted to. But that figure was higher in countries including Thailand (19%), the US (16%), South Africa (15%), Nigeria (14%) and India (13%).
"This is the first time that [the UN] have really gone all-out on low fertility issues," says Prof Stuart Gietel-Basten, demographer at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.
Until recently the agency focused heavily on women who have more children than they wanted and the "unmet need" for contraception.
Still, the UNFPA is urging caution in response to low fertility.
"Right now, what we're seeing is a lot of rhetoric of catastrophe, either overpopulation or shrinking population, which leads to this kind of exaggerated response, and sometimes a manipulative response," says Dr Kanem.
"In terms of trying to get women to have more children, or fewer."
She points out that 40 years ago China, Korea, Japan, Thailand and Turkey were all worried their populations were too high. By 2015 they wanted to boost fertility.
"We want to try as far as possible to avoid those countries enacting any kind of panicky policies," says Prof Gietel-Basten.
"We are seeing low fertility, population ageing, population stagnation used as an excuse to implement nationalist, anti-migrant policies and gender conservative policies," he says.
UNFPA found an even bigger barrier to children than finances was a lack of time. For Namrata in Mumbai that rings true.
She spends at least three hours a day commuting to her office and back. When she gets home she is exhausted but wants to spend time with her daughter. Her family doesn't get much sleep.
"After a working day, obviously you have that guilt, being a mom, that you're not spending enough time with your kid," she says.
"So, we're just going to focus on one."
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Yahoo
As death toll rises, Gazans make life-risking journeys to seek food
By Nidal al-Mughrabi GAZA/CAIRO (Reuters) -Like thousands of other Palestinians in Gaza, Hind Al-Nawajha takes a dangerous, miles-long journey every day to try to get some food for her family, hoping she makes it back alive. Accompanied by her sister, Mazouza, the mother-of-four had to duck down and hide behind a pile of rubble on the side of the road as gunshots echoed nearby. "You either come back carrying (food) for your children and they will be happy, or you come back in a shroud, or you go back upset (without food) and your children will cry," said Nawajha, 38, a resident of Beit Lahiya, in northern Gaza. "This is life, we are being slaughtered, we can't do it anymore." In the past two days, dozens of Palestinians have also been killed by Israeli fire as they tried to get food from aid trucks brought into the enclave by the United Nations and international relief agencies, Gaza medics said. On Thursday, medics said at least 51 people were killed by Israeli gunfire and military strikes, including 12 people who tried to approach a site operated by the U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation in the central Gaza Strip, the latest in near-daily reports of killings of people seeking food. The Israeli military said there were several attempts by "suspects" to approach forces in the area of Netzarim in the central Gaza Strip, in a manner that endangered them. It said forces fired warning shots to prevent suspects from approaching them, and it was currently unaware of injuries in the incident. In an email, GHF criticized Gazan health officials, accusing them of regularly releasing inaccurate information. GHF said that Palestinians do not access the nearby GHF site via the Netzarim corridor. It did not address questions about whether GHF was aware that such an incident had occurred. Thirty-nine people were killed, meanwhile, in separate Israeli airstrikes in the northern Gaza Strip, medics said. One of those strikes killed at least 19 people, including women and children, in a tent in Shati refugee camp in Gaza City, they added. Another strike killed at least 14 people and damaged several houses in Jabalia, in the north of the enclave, medics said. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli army on those attacks. In recent days, the Israeli military said its forces had opened fire and fired warning shots to disperse people who approached areas where troops were operating, posing a threat. It said it was reviewing reports of casualties among civilians. SLEEPING BY THE ROAD Israel has been channelling much of the aid it is now allowing into Gaza through a new U.S.- and Israeli-backed group, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which operates a handful of distribution sites in areas guarded by Israeli forces. The Gaza health ministry said hundreds of Palestinians have been killed trying to reach GHF sites since late May. The United Nations rejects the GHF delivery system as inadequate, dangerous and a violation of humanitarian impartiality rules. Israel says it is needed to prevent Hamas fighters from diverting aid, which Hamas denies. On Wednesday, the GHF said in a statement it had distributed 3 million meals across three of its aid sites without an incident. The Gaza war was triggered when Palestinian Hamas militants attacked Israel on October 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages, according to Israeli tallies. Israel's subsequent military assault on Gaza has killed nearly 55,600 Palestinians, according to Gaza's health ministry, while displacing almost the entire population of more than 2 million and causing a hunger crisis. The Norwegian Refugee Council warned on Thursday that more than 1 million people were without adequate shelter, saying equipment such as tents and tarpaulins had been blocked by Israel from entering since March 1. Nawajha returned empty-handed on Wednesday from her journey to find food, flopping down exhausted on the dusty ground outside the tent in Gaza City, where she has been displaced and sheltering with her family. She and her sister have been camping by the road for the past 20 days. They say they try to force their way into the distribution site where trucks carrying aid arrive, but are often outmuscled by men, who sometimes fight over sacks of flour coming off U.N. trucks. "(When) there is no food, as you can see, children start crying and getting angry," said Nawajha. "When we are for three, four kilometres or more on our legs... Oh my... our feet are bruised and our shoes are torn off."
Bloomberg
3 days ago
- Bloomberg
New Zealand Allows First Medical Use of Magic Mushroom Compound
By Hi, it's Karoline in Singapore, where the use of hallucinogens is largely illegal and subject to severe penalties. But one nation just allowed medical use of 'magic mushrooms'. But before I tell you more... Psilocybin, a hallucinogen found in more than 200 species of 'magic mushrooms' was defined by the UN's 1971 Convention on Psychotropic Substances as a drug with high potential for abuse and not recognized for medical use. But in recent years, studies have shown that it can relieve severe depression when taken in conjunction with psychotherapy.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Yahoo
'Death race' for food: Hundreds killed in Gaza aid chaos
Like "Squid Game." That's how residents describe it, invoking the dystopian TV show when recounting the lethal gantlet that getting aid in famine-haunted Gaza has become. 'It's a death race. The faster, the stronger, the luckier — they're the ones who might survive, might reach the food,' said 30-year-old Mohammed al-Shaqra. 'It feels like we're animals, racing for a box of supplies as if our lives depend on it. And they do.' Ever since Israel sidelined the United Nations and other humanitarian aid organizations late last month and tasked assistance operations to the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, an opaque U.S.- and Israeli-backed private contractor registered in Delaware, killing has been the near-daily companion of aid deliveries. On Thursday, health authorities in Gaza said 12 people were killed near one of the foundation's aid distribution centers, a relatively low toll in a week that saw 59 killed in similar circumstances on Tuesday. Since the foundation began its work May 26, more than 400 people have been killed and more than 3,000 wounded. Al-Shaqra became one of the casualties this month. On June 8, he gathered with thousands of others early in the morning near the aid center in the southern Gaza city of Rafah. It was his third attempt to get food. 'I was desperate to bring something back — flour, rice, pasta, anything — for my parents, my siblings and their kids,' he said. When the passageway to the distribution center opened, Al-Shaqra sprinted as fast as he could, hoping to beat others in the crowd and grab a box. But then an Israeli quadcopter drone — it had been buzzing overhead — started dropping explosives; the third bomb landed close to him, he said. 'My left arm shattered. I looked down and saw the bone hanging, and there was a sharp pain in my guts,' he said. Cradling his arm and trying to stop bleeding from his stomach, he stumbled for almost half a mile before collapsing onto a donkey cart. A kind driver took him to a field hospital for the International Committee of the Red Cross. The doctors saved his arm. The foundation came online two months after Israel cut off all aid entering into Gaza in March, justifying the blockade — despite widespread opprobrium — as a way to pressure the militant group Hamas into releasing hostages even as Palestinian authorities and aid groups reported a starvation crisis. Although the U.N. and humanitarian relief organizations pleaded for access to feed the roughly 2 million people in the Gaza Strip, Israel insisted Hamas was stealing aid, a claim the U.N. and other groups deny and for which Israel has never provided evidence. The alternative, the Israeli government said, would be the foundation. But the group was controversial from the outset, so much so that its first pick as executive director quit before aid deliveries even began, saying the foundation's plan couldn't be implemented without 'breaching humanitarian principles.' Boston Consulting Group, which helped design the distribution system, terminated its contract with the foundation this month and fired two partners involved with the project. Instead of using humanitarian workers, the foundation has deployed armed private contractors with the Israeli military stationed only a hundred yards or so away. It also concentrated aid deliveries to what the group calls four 'fortified' hubs in southern Gaza rather than the roughly 400 smaller centers used by the U.N. and other aid groups across the enclave — forcing already hungry people to walk for miles through active combat zones to access the deliveries. Gaza residents also complain only one or two hubs are usually operating on any given day, and rarely open at the announced time. It's also never stated what's in the food boxes. And rather than directly handing the boxes to people, the group's workers instead dump them on pallets and watch crowds swarm over them. People gather hours in advance on safe routes designated by the Israeli military, but often find themselves under Israeli fire when allowed to approach the hubs. 'It's a real-life version of 'Squid Game.' We run, then the shooting starts, we hit the ground and stay still so we're not killed, then run again,' said Hussein Nizar, a resident who repeatedly tried to get aid, even after his neighbor Ameen Sameer was shot in the head. 'I watched him die beside me," he said. "I couldn't do anything to help out because of all the shooting.' The Israeli military has repeatedly responded to questions about killings near the aid hubs by saying it would look into reports of civilian casualties. In a previous incident, it said troops fired on people approaching them in a threatening manner. Several Palestinians and a foundation spokesman — who gave his name as Majed — said many of the shootings occur when people run beyond the limits of the safe route in an attempt to get to the distribution site faster. Even if they're not wounded or killed, many go home empty-handed, said Jassim, a 28-year-old logistics worker hired by a local contractor working with the foundation. 'Decent people, especially the elderly and women with children, can't fight through the crowds,' he said. He added that gangs also stalk people leaving the delivery area, looking to rob them and sell the precious supplies on the black market. 'Many of them carry knives. It's like a trap, and I see many people killed.' When Al-Shaqra regained consciousness, he found himself in Nasser Hospital, waiting for surgery in rooms already overflowing with other casualties from that day's attacks at the aid hub. Among them was his father, Wadee al-Shaqra, who was injured by a bullet that tore through the side of his abdomen. He lost track of his son after he was shot, but found him hours later, by coincidence, in one of a few tents set up near Nasser Hospital for convalescing patients. 'I thought he was killed. I was so happy to see him I didn't ask if he got any food. I didn't care,' the father said. He added that he and his son went to the hubs despite the danger because they didn't have enough bread to share among his grandchildren. 'We're supposed to protect them,' he said. "We're risking our lives just to keep them from starving.' The foundation says its efforts have been a success, touting its delivery of almost 26 million 'meals' in the 22 days since it started operations. But with almost half a million people facing catastrophic levels of hunger and the entire population contending with acute food security, according to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, the deliveries amount to roughly 0.6 meals per person. The foundation does not elaborate on how it defines a meal, but it previously stated that it calculated daily rations at 1,750 calories, well below the 2,200 calories target used by humanitarian aid organizations. (Majed said recent aid deliveries provide 2,500-calorie provisions.) The bedlam accompanying the group's distribution practices, aid workers say, was entirely predictable. 'Delivery of humanitarian aid can be a very straightforward operation, but it's a complex one,' said Juliette Touma, communications director for the U.N. agency for Palestinians, UNRWA. She added that UNRWA and other groups have decades of experience serving Palestinians, with comprehensive registry lists and an orderly distribution system that assigns appointments at conveniently placed centers. The foundation aid, comprising mostly dry goods such as pasta or lentils, requires gas and water to cook, both of which are hard to procure in Gaza. The aid also does not include hygiene and cleaning supplies, she said — an essential requirement. 'There's this sheer arrogance that the U.N. and humanitarians can be replaced — just like that — by a third party, a private security company. It's not at all like that,' she said. 'Let us do our job.' Read more: More than 55,000 Palestinians have been killed in the Israel-Hamas war, Gaza health officials say Saleem al-Najili, a 33-year-old nurse at the UK-Med field hospital in Deir al Balah, now dreads aid delivery times. 'Every time the GHF center opens its doors, I know what's coming,' he said. 'It means more blood and screaming, more impossible decisions on whom we can treat. And fewer people we can actually save.' Shbeir, a Times special correspondent, reported from Deir al Balah. Staff writer Bulos reported from Beirut. Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
