Population issues in Africa: recent developments and their implications for the African Regional Population Programme

Abstract

The fourth International Population Conference will be held in 1994. It will constitute another step in the United Nations' activities in population and will be preceded by a series of meetings, including the third African Population Conference, in Dakar. It is expected that the upcoming debates will highlight the challenges facing Africa due in part to its population growth and distribution. Priorities of the fourth United Nations Development Decade, which include population, will be reaffirmed, the three others being eradication of poverty and hunger; human resources and institutional development; environment and food and agriculture. Regarding population policies, it can be noted that the continent has achieved some progress in awareness creation, but still is far from formulating and implementing effective policies to tackle prevailing population and development problems. With this state of affairs, however, the support to the African Regional Population Programme (ARPP) has been reduced and its future questionable. The purpose of this document is to draw attention to recent developments in African population issues and to discuss their implications within the framework of an envisaged new orientation for ARPP.