Population problem for Yemen would remain a challenge even if new resources were to be discovered

Sana'a, January 18, 2008

In the presence of the Minister of Public Health and Population, Professor. Abdulkareem Rase'a, and the Deputy Minister for the Ministry of Planning and International Cooperation, Mr. Hesham Sharaf, in addition to key partners at the central level, the UNFPA recently organized its annual planning meeting for 2008. The meeting highlighted activities that will take place at the central and national levels and focused on understanding UNFPA policies and procedures as an international agency.

In the opening ceremony, Mr. Hans Obdeijn, the UNFPA representative, spoke about the importance of the National Population Conference, which took place in December 2007. The Conference theme, "For More Action", was reaffirmed by the Vice-President in the closing ceremony.

"We gained better understanding of the urgency of the issues Yemen is facing in the area of Population and Development," Obdeijn said. "Solutions will be found in the areas of Reproductive Health and Family Planning and the claiming of reproductive rights by women, or what is known as "Safe Motherhood.” Obdeijn added.

The meeting aimed at attaining a better understanding of how the UNFPA and its partners can effectively support each other and how to develop proposals able to lead to successful activities and outcomes. It also aimed at clarifying the kind of support that the UNFPA can offer to both the central and decentralized levels and how they are different but complement each other.

"UNFPA is here in Yemen to assist partners in finding solutions that should ultimately result in successful implementation at the service delivery levels." Obdeijn said. "Once that is achieved, UNFPA will assist, shoulder-to-shoulder with our national and development partners, in the scaling up of these successful activities in order to provoke impact." Obdeijn added. He concluded, "We are transparent and there is no hidden agenda", and called for working as one team.

Mr. Hesham Sharaf delivered a speech on behalf of the Ministry of Planning and International Cooperation, saying that the population issue is a Yemeni issue in the first place. He also emphasized that the population problem in Yemen will remain a challenge even if new resources were to be discovered, because those resources will not ever be able to respond to the high population growth needs. Therefore, he called for dealing with population issues in a faithful manner and not treating them merely as a job to be done.

Sharaf acknowledged that the notion of the central level being able to work by itself was a misunderstanding and affirmed that decentralization represents a major goal for the Yemeni government at the current time.

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