Improve contraception access to tackle wildlife crisis, urges campaign

| August 2, 2019 | Leave a Comment

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Date of Publication: July 11, 2019

Author(s): Damina Carrington

Newspaper: The Guardian

Groups say expanding access to contraception can improve lives and help save wildlife.

A UN-backed campaign has been launched to help tackle the destruction of wildlife by boosting people’s access to contraception.

Growing human populations often underlie the destruction of nature, and barriers to family planning are the “most important ignored environmental challenge”, say the campaigners.

The Thriving Together campaign, launched on World Population Day, unites more than 150 reproductive health and conservation organisations, which spend a combined £8bn a year in 170 countries. The groups say they intend to work together to both improve the lives of people and arrest the huge losses of biodiversity by reducing population growth.

There is very often an overlap of areas facing the greatest need for improved reproductive health services and for conservation,” says a declaration signed by the groups, which include the UN Population Fund, the Jane Goodall Institute and Marie Stopes International. “We believe that by working together we can help human communities and their ecosystems thrive.”

The Goodall institute has provided family planning services as part of its work since 1994, and its founder said bare hills had been returned to forests as women chose to have smaller families. “With more and more people being born and wanting a better standard of living, it is clear that ‘business as usual’ will destroy the natural resources of our planet,” Goodall said. “We only have a small window of time to change things and it is closing fast.”

Read the full article here. 

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