UN Agency Calls for Population Control in Nigeria
Posted on: Sunday, 14 November 2004, 09:00 CST
UN agency calls for population control in Nigeria
LAGOS, Nov. 13 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations Population Fund ( UNFPA) has called for population control in Nigeria, regarding the issue necessary for development in Africa's most populous country, according to the official News Agency of Nigeria Saturday.
The UN agency urged the Nigerian government to take the issue of population reduction seriously as the country's poverty profile is traceable to the ever-bloating nature of the population.
Oluwafisan Bankole, national project adviser of the UNFPA, was quoted as saying that Nigeria's population explosion had resulted in deplorable conditions, making it difficult for the country to develop.
"It is clear that in the nation's population, the weight is heavier at the bottom, which can be translated as the place for the children of ages from 0 to 15, which is the nonproductive category," he said.
"The situation shows that the dependency ratio is very high, with 45 percent of the population nonproductive."
He called on families to heed the call for family planning and produce as much children as they could cater for.
"A lot of people in the country spend about 35 percent of their lifetime taking care of other people's children because people produce more children than their income both during and after active periods can carry," he said.
Bankole further called on the government to invest on enlightenment programs to keep the citizenry aware of prevailing issues on population and development.
Nigeria at present has a population of 130 million, and it's not showing any sign of stopping of bloating. One family with four to six children is commonplace in Nigeria. The World Bank says that 70 percent of them are living below the international poverty benchmark of one US dollar per day.
Source: Xinhua News Agency - CEIS
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