In line with the campaign of achieving the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDG) by 2015, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) Executive Director Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin visited the Philippines last May 17-19 to meet the stakeholders to mobilize support for the country. Aside from that he met with President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III to discuss important matters including the current state of maternal and child mortality and health care in the Philippines. According to Osotimehin even the country is less likely to achieve this segment of the MDG like other countries, he said that there is progress in terms of projects that benefits both women and child especially the pregnant mothers in line with health care system and also the information drive about their maternal rights and family planning became almost accessible to all.
Aside from the stakeholders and the president, Osotimehin also met with some of the cabinet secretaries that has coverage on population management and maternal and child care to discuss projects including the current Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) or commonly known as the Improving the Human Capital of the Poor (Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program) under the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD). He also visited Cagayan de Oro to check the current situation of the Filipinos who were victims of Typhoon Sendong (Washi) and to see possible help they can offer to the families in the area.
UNFPA partners with different organizations, both government and non-government; religious or non-religious, Dr. Osotimehin mentioned that there were instances of conflict in some areas like belief on the family planning method and the controversial reproductive health bill, he says their agency looks for a common ground where their partner organizations and communities can agree with and that is important to them to fully implement support to local and national projects. They’re currently on creating a disaster risk reduction based project with the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) that includes emergency transport e.g. sea ambulance, calibrated intervention package, SMS-internet based service delivery models, inter-local health zones and also ensuring culture-sensitivity approaches to our brother and sister in the Islamic faith.
Here’s the short video of Dr.Osotimehin giving a short message before the question and answer:
From 1972 to0 2011, UNFPA already invested $147 M to support government’s poverty reduction program that include family planning, same motherhood, gender equality, population management, policy making and data gathering to know the statistics and areas where help is mostly needed. While in the 7th Country Programme that started last 2011 and will be ending on 2016, the UNFPA raise around $28.5 M and will expecting more funds from their stakeholders and supporters as the project progresses. The project aims to cater to poverty incidence, population size, reproductive health condition of the people (including maternal mortality, adolescent fertility, contraceptive prevalence and skilled birth attendance), gender development index, and the prevalence of violence against women. Provinces under this project include Albay, Camarines Sur, Sarangani, Surigao del Sur, Compostela Valley, Camarines Norte, Mountain Province, Ifugao, Masbate, Sultan Kudarat and Eastern Samar.
Aside from the Philippines, Dr. Osotimehin will be visiting China, South Korea and Thailand as part of his Asian tour in getting more information about the current state of MDG 5 in partner countries which he will be discussing at the upcoming RIO+20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development on June 20-22 in Brazil. It will cover the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) Beyond 2012 Review and the post 2015 MDG scenario.
