European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - September 12, 1994, Darmstadt, Hesse Monday september 12, 1994 commentary the stars stripes Page 13 Vatican s efforts shameful at Caird Rhee tin g Anna Quindlen when Tim Wirth the undersecretary of state for global affairs first began to Lay the administration s rhetorical groundwork for the global population conference in Cairo Egypt the note he sounded seemed inspired. Sustainable development cannot be realized without the full engagement Complete empowerment of women Wirth said in a speech in March. Bypassing the contentious divisions of overpopulation is. Over consumption developed is. Developing nations the fights of women could unite All in Strate Gies for a world whose population has doubled in the last four dec Ades might triple by the end of the next Century. Unity of course was not what came out in the coverage of Cairo. Much was made of the conflict Between the majority of nations represented there an Alli Ance of the Vatican islamic Funda mentalists who oppose Legal abortion an decry the secular modernism they find in the conference Aims. Too Little was made of the fact that this conflict is in some measure irrelevant. While experts Bicker Over whether the problem is population or economic development the Battle touring Down the world s birthrate has Al ready been joined by precisely those people styled by Wirth As the Linchpin of the Cairo conference. The world s women Are increasingly moving to bring the birthrate Down on ado it yourself basis. Not because of deforestation or famine per be but because itis better for their children. Trying to div vide their attention among four trying to Divide a Small Stock of Tood among six Many now embrace a Standard of morality that emphasizes the Quality of life they can provide Over the Quantity of children they can produce. Consider Cairo itself where crowded apartment buildings Are being raised Ever skyward to accommodate More human beings in a City that can ill afford them. While islamic orthodoxy has fwd Fine Shoutd just stick wih St fur like none ton been on the Rise in Egypt so has the use of contraception. The average number of children an egyptian woman will have has dropped from five in 1980 to 3.9 today. In Brazil which has the world s largest Catholic population two thirds of married women practice birth control. In 1970, the average brazilian family had close to six children today the number is slightly Over two. The Catholic Church will not Bend units opposition to contraception which Means it had Little More to contribute to this discussion than a cardiologist who does not believe in surgery could offer at a symposium on heart disease. Vatican representatives instead focused on the demographic colonialism selfish individualism of developed nations. One Cardinal recently waxed poetic an paternalistic about the love of life among the poor As though raising Chil Dren in squalor should be counted As a great Blessing. None of that obviates this Bedrock fact millions of women simply want fewer children at greater intervals. Study by the Alan Guttmacher Institute of women in sub saharan Africa for example showed that As Many As half in some countries reported that they did not want their most recent pregnancy at that time or at All. The Vatican engineered shameful alliances for the Cairo Confer ence sending emissaries to both Libya Iran in its Pursuit of at any All costs opposition to Legal abortion. It is an opposition that seem grounded in the belief that illegal equals nonexistent a belief belied by the Evi Dence. Brazil serves again As a Model the Church has lobbied hard to keep abortion illegal there yet As Many illegal abortions Are performed in Brazil As Legal ones in the United states. The difference Only 10,000 american women Are hospitalized for complications of abortion each year while in Brazil the number is 400,000. Itis hard to find the greater Good in that statistic. The Cairo conference has not been a colloquy about abortion much a these few orthodox religious leaders at tempted to make it so it has been about a complicated web of education ploy ment consumption poverty development health care. It has also been about whether govern ments will follow where women have so clearly led them toward Safe simple an reliable choices in family planning. While Cairo crackled with conflict in the Homes of the world the orthodoxies have been duly heard roundly ignored. C new York Elmob Ion giving birth to More woes i suppose there should have been a birth announcement though Tarn not sure congratulations Are in the moment the colourful Assembly of people from 170 countries arrived in Cairo Egypt for . Conference on population development to the moment they leave the world gained 2 million More of these babies Are welcomed by parents with Joy. Many Are greeted with traditional family tribal rituals. But too Many others slip into overburdened lands overwhelmed lives adding to the despair of their most of human history babies have been the uni Versal Symbol of Hope for the future. But As a number As a statistic they have also become a Symbol of a worrisome future. In the language of our time people Are also the population Fertility the goddess of Bounty is also a destructive Force. And our great Suc Cess As a species carries with it an air of failure. In Cairo the delegates had All kinds of ways to up just How fruitful been exactly How we have the year . 1, there were 200 million people on the planet. By 1800, there were 1 billion of us. By 1900, 2 billion. Now there Are 5.6 billion of us the optimistic goal of the . Plan is Only 7.5 billion by the year 2015.Only the most self deceptive or fatalistic of us can Overlook the meaning in these numbers a birthrate that s outstripping even the Green revolution s ability to feed people. A population growth that s outpacing All but the most ambitious plans of developing countries to employ people. Human passengers sorely taxing what the environmentalists Call the carrying capacity of years ago at the , conference in Bucharest Romania the developing nations still thought that birth control was an imperialist notion. No More. Ten years ago in Mexico City the american government under Ronald Reagan said that economic development was the Only Way to stabilize the Popula Tion. No More. The Road to Cairo was paved by leaders fieldworkers government no govern ment organizers who agree that economic development contraception must fit together in a complicated Jigsaw Puzzle to stabilize population. The have Learned that the education of women empowering women in the mantra of the world s grass roots organizers is the one sure Way to reduce the birthrate. But if the Cairo conference has been a tribute to this consensus it was also a testimony to How quickly agreement can be overshadowed by conflict How swiftly common ground can become a Battleground. One paragraph in a 113-Page document received 90 percent of the attention. Abortion not a form of family plan Ning but a failure of family phoning dominated too Many Days in c Airo. Ellen Goodman the Vatican came officially As delegates from a Sovereign City state in the Middle of Rome. But the also came As religious opponents of contraception whose or message is ignored by catholics outside their very own Gates. Quick what country has the lowest birthrate in the world Italy in a unholy Alliance of holy men the Vatican took up with some of the fundamentalist muslims who to Gether tried to turn a conference on population development into a forum on abortion sexuality. They tried to turn the debate from the methods to the morality of limiting population to turn attention from a joint Effort of the world to a clash of cultures. Clashes Over the role of women clashes Over sexual rights wrongs do exist. The West has not always been the most enlightened of role models. But the countries that came together in. The City of 13 million egyptians asked if we can t agree. Agree on a 20-year plan to try to slow population be fore it is controlled by starvation by War by Environ mental collapse. It does t Lake an alarmist to know that we Are running out of time room. Mother Teresa sent a message to the conference say ing god has created a world big enough for All the lives he wishes to be she said that if there is a child that you Don t want or can t feed or educate give that child i m afraid that the world does not expand. We cannot build new additions for the babies. And no not even Mother Teresa can care for a Quarter million More children every single Day. Glob
