Thanks to Debbi McGlauflin for this announcement.

If you have heard of the TED Talk events (www.ted.com) and wondered how to get to go to one, here’s your chance, courtesy of Jim Thompson at the State Department’s Global Partnership Center. RSVP info is on the attached flyer. They only have room for 500 and, in Washington, DC, it’s likely to fill up quickly.

Ted Conference Global Partnerships (PDF, 275 KB)

Thanks to Bob Walker for bringing my attention to the new (June) issue of National Geographic, which has a compelling special report (“The Global Food Crisis: The End of Plenty”) that looks at the “perpetual food crisis” that is emerging and concludes that:

We don’t want to think about limits. But as we approach nine billion people on the planet, all clamoring for the same opportunities, the same lifestyles, the same hamburgers, we ignore them at our risk.
Read the rest of this entry »

The new U.S. ambassador for global women’s issues pledged Thursday the Obama administration’s “deep commitment” to a U.N. blueprint aimed at slowing the world’s population explosion and empowering women.

At the heart of the more than 100-page action plan adopted at the U.N. population conference in Cairo, Egypt, 15 years ago is a demand for women’s equality through education, economic development, access to modern birth control and the right to choose if and when to become pregnant.

For full article, visit:
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article

Thanks to Paul Ehrlich for this memo to then President-elect Obama on “What Needs to be Done.”

What Needs to be Done (Word Doc., 54 KB)

President Clinton and the Clinton Foundation are looking for input on their new climate initiative. Enter your request (in the form of a question) that population issues be included at http://clintonfoundation.org/what-we-do/clinton-climate-initiative/contact/. The deadline for your input is Thursday, May 21. Bill Clinton will answer four questions in a video on their website.
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Thanks to Katie Elmore and Henry Barbaro for bringing to my attention the Earth Day special of National Public Radio’s The Diane Rehm Show titled “World Population.”

Speakers on the segment included:
William Butz, president and CEO, Population Reference Bureau,
Paul Ehrlich, president, Center for Conservation Biology, Bing Professor of Population Studies, Stanford University and author of “The Dominant Animal” and “The Population Bomb,” and
Hania Zlotnik, Director, Population Division, United Nations.
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Thanks to John Rowley of People & the Planet for this editorial.
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More than a decade after the world agreed a progressive agenda on population and development at the 1994 Cairo conference on the subject, today’s leaders are waking up to the reality of 15 wasted years. Cairo was almost unique in costing the money needed to tackle the developing world’s scandalously high maternal mortality and morbidity rates, setting out the spending needed on reproductive health and family planning, alongside other priorities for the health, status and education of girls and women in particular.

For full article, visit:
http://www.peopleandplanet.net/

The population clock on Population Media Center’s home page (www.populationmedia.org) rolled over to 6.8 billion people today.

Thanks to Bill Butz and Carl Haub of the Population Reference Bureau for pointing me to the 2007 data set provided by the UN Population Division, showing the results of the biennial survey of countries’ stated population policies. As Carl points out, translating statements into action is another thing. The data set can be downloaded at: http://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/wpp2007/WPPdownload.htm

On March 11, the UN Population Division released this press advisory about their updated global projections. See their homepage at http://www.un.org/esa/population/unpop.htm

PRESS RELEASE
Embargoed until 12:00 PM, 11 March, 2009
WORLD POPULATION TO EXCEED 9 BILLION BY 2050:
Developing Countries to Add 2.3 Billion Inhabitants with 1.1 Billion Aged
Over 60 and 1.2 Billion of Working Age

NEW YORK, 11 March (UN Population Division/DESA) – World population is projected to
reach 7 billion early in 2012, up from the current 6.8 billion, and surpass 9 billion people by
2050, reveals the 2008 Revision of the official United Nations population estimates and
projections, released today.
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Thanks to Kurt Dahl for this article.

Incidentally, the opinions expressed below are those of Kurt Dahl. While I share some of his concerns, I do think that the problem of population growth can be solved without any form of coercion, with respect for the rights of women and men to choose the number and spacing of their children, and in the context of increasing per capita economic welfare as the number of capitas begins to decline. There are also many donors that recognize population growth as a concern, although there is no doubt that funding in the field of population remains insufficient to meet the needs for family planning information and services globally.
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Some things are so preeminent within their context that they need no adjectives or explanation. Ask any American football fan what is referred to by “The Play” and they will tell you about the final play in the 1982 Cal/Stanford game when, after several laterals and a mad dash through the Stanford band, Cal scored the winning touchdown as time expired (do a Google search on “the play” and see for yourself). Likewise, “The Open” refers only to the British Open golf tournament, even though there are dozens of other “Open” athletic events.

For full article, visit:
http://www.populationelephant.com/PEtheproblemarticle.html