Beijing Declaration

Asian Forum of Parliamentarians on Population and Development
7th General Assembly
 

Beijing, 17-18 October, 2002
 

Preamble

1. We, … …parliamentarians from……countries of Asia-Pacific countries have assembled again in Beijing, China, for the 7th General Assembly and 20 years celebration of AFPPD. The present Assembly is a continuation of the past six assemblies successively held in New Delhi, Beijing, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Canberra and Nigata. Looking back on the course of the activities of Asian Forum in the past 20 years since its founding, we fully affirm its achievements. After extensive discussions, at the two-day Assembly, on population and development with the relevant opportunities and challenges, we have reached a broad consensus and unanimously reaffirmed our commitment to population and development.

2. Since its founding in Beijing in 1981, the Asian Forum has dedicated itself to raising awareness of and advocating for population and development issues among elected representatives and -through them- members of the general public. It has established a national forum of relevant representatives in most of the countries in the region and has also helped form the regional forums in the Africa and Arab region and Europe;

3. The population of the Asia-Pacific region was 3.52 billion in 1995. Although population growth is slowing in some countries, the region’s population generally will still continue to increase. It is projected to increase to 4.58 billion by the year 2020. This equals an increase of over 1 billion or 30 percent over 25 years. Moreover, with the acceleration of urbanization and aging and the spread of AIDS epidemic, population growth has brought about numerous new challenges to the region in addition to its pressure on resources and ecological environment;

4. Humankind is confronted with complex and profound challenges taking place all over the world. We are called upon by the new situation to proceed from the larger interest of harmony between human beings and nature and complimentarity between environment and development and to take the road of sustainable development with stronger determination and commitment.

Call for Action

We……

5. Reaffirm the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) and the Cairo and Hague Declarations on Population and Development adopted by the Parliamentarians on the eve of ICPD and later at the review of ICPD. In order to pursue and promote the population and development programme and meet the new challenges. AFPPD urges the parliaments of various countries to mobilize more of their members to take part in the activities of this field;

6. Urge all governments to continuously formulate and improve laws and regulations on control of population growth, environmental protection, resource management, and disaster prevention and reduction;

7. Urge all governments to implement the ICPD Programme of Action with renewed vigour as population planning is the base for future development strategy, involvement of civil society, and strategies emphasizing the inter-relations among population, water, food security, natural resources and poverty;

8. Urge all governments to clearly integrate poverty reduction strategize into population and development programmes, while recognizing that in spite of economic growth, poverty is widely prevalent in the region with more than one billion people living below the poverty line, and realizing that poverty is closely linked to various aspects of population growth;

9. Urge all Governments to ensure that international agreements and conventions, especially those on environmental issues are fully consistent with food and water security, acknowledging the inseparable strong linkages between population and sustainable development, and appreciating the recent UN World Summit on Sustainable Development, we call on all countries to take measures to carry out the follow-up activities of the World Summit, and Basic needs and conditions for human survival should be given priority, including food security in the process of economic development. Population factor should be taken into full consideration in the implementation of those international agreements, conventions and relevant national strategies;

10. Call on the United Nations, and in particular the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), to continue to play an important role in helping countries formulate and implement population policies and strategies;

11. Also call upon Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), as the regional organization of the United Nations dedicated to economic and social sevelopment, to accord priority to population and development in its efforts to assist the member countries to formulate, implement and monitor their population, including reproductive health programmes as population factors play a significant role in development;

12. Reiterate with concern that the resources available for population and reproductive health are not sufficient and funding is declining. We call upon all donor governments to increase the official development assistance to population related programmes. We also urge our fellow parliamentarians to strive to increase investment in the social and health sectors, particularly, for population and development and call on all partners concerned to ensure that available resources are used effectively and efficiently;

13. Recognize that HIV/AIDS is an extremely serious issue that requires an urgent, coordinated response in many of our countries, and urge our fellow parliamentarians to increase their efforts to ensure effective HIV/AIDS legislation, preventive measures as well as treatment and care for people living with HIV/AIDS;

14. Realize that young people are especially prone to risk behaviour, including unprotected sex, and drug use, making them vulnerable to acquire HIV/AIDS and other STDs. About 50% of the new HIV/AIDS infections in Asia occur in the age group of 15-24 years. We urge our fellow parliamentarians to place special emphasis on adolescent reproductive health, and to ensure that young people are paid full attention and provided with more convenient services;

15. Ensure protection of the rights of women; emphasize that sexual abuse and violence against women cause and sustain the psychological and physical impairment of women, and emphasize that the elimination of violence against women is fundamental to the achievement of women's rights and until that issue is addressed, sustainable and equitable national and regional development cannot be achieved;

16. Urge our fellow parliamentarians to plan policies that ensure that the elderly are well taken care of and that their needs and rights are respected, while noting the substantive increases in the proportion of elderly people in many countries of the region, and the effect ageing has on economic, social, and health developments,

17. Realizing the oncoming crisis fro clean drinking water for the masses, the parliamentarians should encourage Governement Organizations, Non-Government Organizations, and civil societies to create awareness to save water through water harvesting and other ingenious methods, and ensure that water is available to all, particularly to the people from developing counties who live in poverty.

Pledge

We pledge….

18. To act more effectively to ensure that our government give due attention to the population and development programmes and emphasize their inter-relations with food security, water, environment, and poverty;

19. To ensure that population and development programmes are effectively implemented, through monitoring the programmes and educating our constituency members to use the services;

20. To oppose any move to dilute the population agenda as we firmly believe that development, food security, and poverty reduction are not possible without proper population planning;

21. To ask our governments to emphasize the importance of population policies and programmes in development, food security and poverty reduction work undertaken by ESCAP, at the forthcoming Asian and Pacific Population Conference;

22. To bring to the attention of our fellow parliamentarians the importance of the HIV/AIDS issue and motivate them to ensure that an effective and adequately funded national policy and programme is in place by the earliest time possible;

23. To involve women parliamentarians in our committees and programmes and to give emphasis to gender equality and equity at the national level;

24. To increase our efforts to remove legal, social and cultural barriers that prevent women from fully participating in society;

25. To urge developed countries to ensure that increased resources are allocated for population and reproductive health, and HIV/AIDS related programmes in their ODAs, and urge UNFPA to continue to support the parliamentarians’ involvement in population and development programmes at the national and regional level;

26. To recognize AFPPD as an important forum for the exchanges of the parliaments and parliamentarians of the Asia-Pacific region. It also serves as an important channel to increase exchanges among the people of the region to gain more mutual understanding, confidence and cooperation. We believe that with the common efforts of parliamentarians from various countries, the Asian Forum will continuously develop and make greater contribution to the realization of population growth in harmony with socio-economic development, resource utilization and environmental protection for the sake of sustainable development and food security in the Asia-Pacific Region.