Unleashing the power of gender equality to spur national development - World Population Day commemorated

To enable them to contribute meaningfully towards economic growth and overall social development, investing in their health and education, and providing them opportunities for decent work is critical to national development.

This inspired the theme for this year’s World Population Day commemoration - “Unleashing the power of gender equality to spur national development”. The national event to mark the day was organized by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in collaboration with the National Population Council (NPC), and the Regional Institute for Population Studies (RIPS), University of Ghana.

The UNFPA Deputy Country Director, Dr. Emily Namphambo echoed the importance of the celebration, which serves as a reminder to work towards achieving a prosperous, peaceful, and sustainable future by harnessing the power of every human being on the planet.  She emphasized the need to harness the full potential of girls, encouraging their aspirations to improve society and realizing sexual and reproductive health and rights for all as the foundation for achieving gender equality, dignity, and opportunity. “Empowering women and girls, through education and access to modern contraception, helps to support them in pursuing their goals and also to live a dignified life.” she added.

The Deputy Government Statistician, Dr. Faustina Frempong-Ainguah of the Ghana Statistical Service said high illiteracy in women and girls and low number of women in the labor force create disparities against women in society, making it difficult to unleash the power of gender equality to spur national development. “Ghana will [not]… achieve 100% of its developmental goals if 50.9% of its population, [who are women] cannot achieve their full potential” she said.

The keynote speaker was, Dr. Joshua Amo-Adjei from the University of Cape Coast. Addressing the issue of gender inequality, Dr. Amo-Adjei noted that “Throughout the world one group of people who have suffered from discrimination are women and girls. In our own local context if we look at many of the things we sought to do, either increasing or limiting human numbers, intends to harm women more than men.”  He emphasized on the need to teach women about contraceptives to empower them in preventing unwanted pregnancies, as well as including men and boys in gender-equality discussion.

There were solidarity messages and remarks from NPC, RIPS, Planned Parenthood Association of Ghana (PPAG), and a representative from the Parliament of Ghana. They all connoted to the essence of empowering women to achieve national development.