By Christabel Addo, GNA’s Special
Correspondent, Nairobi, Kenya (Courtesy UNFPA)
Narobi (Kenya), Nov. 14, GNA – The
Government of Ghana has pledged its commitment to improving universal access to
reproductive health services and reduce maternal mortality rates of 70 per 100,
000 live births, as well as maternal
morbidity by 2030.
It further commits to reducing under-five
mortality rate to below 12 per 1000 live births also by 2030, and enhance
access for all vulnerable groups including Persons with Disability to the full
complement of family planning information and services.
The Government said it would also engage
young people meaningfully, bringing to ‘zero’ all incidences of gender-based
violence and harmful practices including child marriages and female genital
mutilation.
Dr Kodjo Mensah-Abrampa, the
Director-General of the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC), said
this at the ongoing Global Summit of the International Conference on Population
and Development (ICPD25) in Nairobi.
He said the commitment took stock of
progress made within the past 25 years of implementing the ICPD-Programme of
Action (PoA) in the country, the challenges as well as prospects for
acceleration of its objectives.
He noted that although substantial progress
had been made in addressing the country’s population and reproductive health
issues, it had been slow in some areas, and that much more work would be
required to cover all areas.
He said Ghana stood committed to the
Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which also re-echoed the ICPD by placing
people, planet and prosperity at the centre of development and leaving no one
behind.
Dr Mensah-Abrampa cited the progress made in
gender parity, especially in education from kindergarten to the secondary
levels, maternal and child mortality rates, poverty reduction, contraceptive
prevalence among the youth and older persons, Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs)
and irregular migration.
Based on these the Government reaffirmed
further commitments to the implementation of the ICPD promise of ensuring
Sexual Reproductive Health (SRH) services as affirmed by the SDGs and ensure fundamental
rights by upholding, respecting and protecting all individual rights.
Other commitment included harnessing the
demographic dividend for sustained socio-economic growth and development and
ensuring that progress was made in the other key sectors of the economy.
Dr Mensah-Abrampa said Ghana was committed
to ensuring universal access, reducing to six per cent unmet needs for family
planning and services by 2030, equality, affordability, and safe modern
contraceptives for all men, women, and youth who needed those services.
To achieve this, more domestic financial
resources would be mobilised through innovative financing instruments and
sources.
Government, he said, was also committed to
further enhancing access for all adolescents and youth to culturally sensitive
and age-appropriate information, education and adolescent-friendly and
responsive reproductive health services.
It would also ensure equitable distribution
of resources to all health facilities across geographic regions including
posting of health professionals.
Another key commitment is to enhance the
availability of data for accountability and decision making by ensuring good
and disaggregated population and administrative data, and investing in digital
innovations and integrated data systems.
It is also important that Ghana commit to
strengthening partnership with the private sector, Civil Society Organisations,
young people, development partners, religious and community leaders and other
groups in the country and establish structures for effective engagement on the
implementation of the ICPD and other PoAs.
The three-day Nairobi ICPD25 Summit was
co-organised by the governments of Kenya and Denmark as well as the United
Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).
It focused on endorsing the voluntary global
commitments that are largely centered on the “three zeros” of
eliminating preventable maternal deaths, unmet needs for family planning, and
gender-based violence including harmful practices such as female genital
mutilation against women and girls among other limitations.
GNA
