Population

Advocates of high population growth; your brains must have gone on leave
By Dr Chris Baryomunsi

There have been arguments about population growth in Uganda with some questioning whether the country is under-populated. Today, Uganda is experiencing the highest population growth rate ever at 3.6% per annum, probably the highest rate in the world. Uganda's population estimated at 29.2 million makes her the 38th most populated country in the world.

A Ugandan woman’s fertility rate is 6.7 children, the third highest in the world. The question is not the population size but the rate at which it is growing. For a country like Uganda, still in the early stages of demographic transition, it is dangerous to urge the population to produce children without cautious consideration of the implications. Some people have falsely argued that countries like Japan, with a population of 130 million, China (1.32 billion) and India (1.16 billion) have made economic strides because of their huge populations.

There is strong evidence that these countries initiated robust economic reforms but backed by strong population and family planning policies. Japan, for instance, initiated one of the strongest family planning programmes after the World War II, which resulted in lowering of the total fertility rate now at 1.2 children per woman. China initiated economic reforms in 1978 and also initiated a strong, though repressive, one child policy in 1979 that still holds to date.

These countries' main concern is the quality of their population and not merely the numbers.If correct that the larger the population of a country the wealthier, then Uganda would be the 38th richest nation in the world. It would be richer than the following countries with their indicated populations; Belgium 10.4m, Sweden 9.1m, Denmark 5.4m and Norway 4.7m.

These countries, on the contrary, are donors supporting Uganda. One would further ask why Botswana has one of the highest GDP south of the Sahara yet its population is only 1.8 million! Or how come that Nigeria with its 135 million people, the world’s ninth most populous country and Ethiopia (75 million), the 16th most populous are not among the top rich countries? The dangers of advocating a rapid population growth are obvious both at aggregate and individual levels.

If the population grows unchecked, we shall end up with a mass of poor, low quality people that in themselves become a burden to the government. Indeed in Uganda, most of the achievements gained in economic growth and service provision continue to be undermined by the high and increasing population growth. For instance, though poverty levels have been declining, the increasing population masks this achievement.

The absolute numbers of people in dire poverty continue to rise and this makes it hard to realise any tangible changes in poverty reduction. The prevailing land wrangles, scarcity of drugs in health centres, the poor quality of school education as well as high levels of unemployment are partly due to the population pressure. Over 50% of the Ugandan population is aged below 15 and this poses development, social and political challenges, which must be addressed.At an individual level, the burden of bearing many children is mainly borne by a woman.

Telling her to produce many children is another way of asking her to dig her own grave. In Uganda we lose more than 6000 mothers annually due to maternal deaths meaning 16 mothers everyday. They die because they conceive while young, often get unwanted pregnancies and poorly spaced. The disturbing irony is that some of the elite that advocate many children produce few. They should remember that what is good for the goose is also good for the gander.In Uganda, the population will continue to increase for some time.

However, it is extremely crucial to ensure that we check our population growth. The percentage of eligible women using family planning has remained at 23% over the last decade.

And yet the unmet need for family planning has over the same period increased from 29% to 41%. This means there are many women who would like to stop or space childbearing but are not accessing contraceptives. This definitely calls for urgent action. It is instructive that Uganda must take action on her population growth.

It is this action that will guarantee success of the many progressive policies like universal education and prosperity for all. Ugandans particularly women should not produce children by chance but by choice. And they should neither produce them too early or too late nor should they be too many and too frequently. Over to you Ugandans.

The writer is the Chairman, Uganda Parliamentary Forum on Food Security, Population and Development, and Member of Parliament for Kinkizi East Constituency