Population explosion threatens progress, UNFPA
-25,000 women die every year due to birth

By Hallelujah Lulie

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia-The population growth rate in Ethiopia and the magnitude of other indicators are a big threat for the nation’s attempts at eradicating poverty and meet the Millennium Development Goals, Dr. Monidue Rakotomalala, UNFPA representative to Ethiopia told SSI.

During an event marking of the World Population Day this Wednesday July 11, 2007 the representative said “although there are significant changes in the sector in the past few years regarding family planning, a lot much more is expected to harmonize the rate of population growth with the pace of the nation’s development and resource utilization.”
Mr. Mekonen Manyazewal, Ethiopia’s state minister for Finance and Economic Development repeated the same warning that the rate of population growth and the capacity of the country for development and rational utilization of natural resources is at stake because of the high population growth and dependency ratio in the country.

“The government has been intensively engaged with the issue in the past 14 years and significant improvements has been registered, but ethiopia s still one of the countries in the sub saharan region with a very high birth and death rate” Mekonen said.
the state minister added “The Ethiopian population touched the 77 million line this july and 33 million of this are children who are under the age 15 which is putting a huge burden on the productive population and raising the dependency ratio.”

This year’s world population day is commemorated under the theme “men as partners in maternal health” appeals to husbands, fathers, sons and friends to unite and stop the unacceptable maternal deaths and other pre and post maternal problems the women face.
Rakotomalala said that the maternal health situation in Ethiopia remains dire creating a daunting challenge in meeting the important goal of improving maternal health, “about 25,000 women die every year due to birth related complicacies, while 500,000 suffer from life-long complications including obstetric fistula and paralysis.”

“Skilled attendance at birth in the country is as low as 6 percent and only 5 percent of babies are delivered in health facilities. in contrast the average for Africa in this respect is 40 percent”, the UNFPA head said.