A Consensus Bill on Population: Addressing Adolescent Sexuality and Reproductive Health

1. International Youth Foundation Global Partners Meeting October 9, 2010 I Washington, DC A Consensus Bill on Population:Addressing Adolescent Sexuality and Reproductive Health Felicitas C. Rixhon Executive Director Philippine Center for Population and Development

2. Presentation outline • Population growth and young people • Population and human development issues of young people • Population and development program for young people • Solution: legislation is key • Strategies and challenges in passing a legislation

3. Population growth and young people • Almost 3 out of 10 young Filipinos belong to poor families • 1 in 10 young women, ages 15 to 19 is already a mother • Almost half of women, ages 20-24 will have begun bearing children • The youth share of the total population remains high at 50 percent of 94 million Photo by Cristina Luisa Sevilla Present and future generations are already born, does not augur well with Philippine ability to reduce population growth

4. Population and human development issues of young people • High population growth results to lower per capita income and higher poverty incidence • Poverty rates in the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao exceed 69 percent, which is 4 times that of the National Capital Region • High population growth exacerbates poverty • hungry children increased by over a million in three years • High population inhibits young peoples’ development • In five years, school dropouts bolted from 1.8 million to 2.2 million • Quality of education remains poor

5. Population and Development program for young people The Philippine Center for Population and Development (PCPD) invests in youth education necessary for human capital development.

6. Population and Development programs for young people • Attempts to integrate population and development topics in the public education curriculum were started as early as the 70s Challenges • Controversial; risk of being “deleted “ due to opposition from the Catholic Church • Support for sustained and improved curricular offering • Uneven quality of population education and fertility awareness • Teacher training irregular • Instructional materials for teachers and students not updated

7. Population and Development programs for young people • Youth centers offer formal and informal FP/RH education • Challenges: • Most youth centers are NGO run, thus limited due to availability of funds • NGOs need to integrate FP/RH in their development program

8. Solution: Legislation is key • National policy helps create a better impact • Provides framework and regulatory environment for good programming • Classifies issue as national priority • Allocates resources for implementation • Assures continuity and scale-up of programs

9. Solution: Legislation is key Hallmarks of good policy • Equalizes opportunities for people • Removes financial barriers to access • Issues and programs are not at the mercy of political bargaining, but ensure persistent and united effort to accomplish goal

10. Solution: Legislation is key Hallmarks of good policy • Requires coherence of associated policies • Is holistic – all relevant sectors are involved and rally around specific approaches • Activities/services converge • Identifies clear targets

11. Strategies and challenges • Consultative way of drafting bill (but in the absence of genuine dialogue and trust, even this would be difficult to achieve) • Mobilizing broad and multi-sectoral support , including: • Securing legislative support • Involving the executive branch

12. Strategies and challenges • Broad or Specific – too many details will freeze the law; Flexibility is necessary to factor in emerging trends • Well-organized and structured campaign for passage of bill • mass mobilization • mass media: traditional and new • System for monitoring progress

13. visit our website at www.pcpd.ph Thank You