• woodrow wilson center
  • ecsp

New Security Beat

Subscribe:
  • mail-to
  • Who We Are
  • Topics
    • Population
    • Environment
    • Security
    • Health
    • Development
  • Columns
    • China Environment Forum
    • Choke Point
    • Dot-Mom
    • Navigating the Poles
    • New Security Broadcast
    • Reading Radar
  • Multimedia
    • Water Stories (Podcast Series)
    • Backdraft (Podcast Series)
    • Tracking the Energy Titans (Interactive)
  • Films
    • Water, Conflict, and Peacebuilding (Animated Short)
    • Paving the Way (Ethiopia)
    • Broken Landscape (India)
    • Scaling the Mountain (Nepal)
    • Healthy People, Healthy Environment (Tanzania)
  • Publications
  • Events
  • Contact Us

NewSecurityBeat

The blog of the Wilson Center's Environmental Change and Security Program
  • Guest Contributor

    Population-Health-Environment Effort Launched in American Samoa

    November 25, 2008 By Alyssa Edwards
    The government of American Samoa has decided to boldly address the issue of rapid population growth, due to its potentially severe environmental impacts on the territory. Governor Togiola Tulafono’s Coral Reef Advisory Group, for which I work, has identified population pressure as the single largest threat to American Samoa’s coastal resources. This is an important finding because all of American Samoa’s population lives along the coast, and the entire territory is considered a coastal zone.

    The government recently hosted a Population Summit with more than 130 key stakeholders to discuss the problems and to devise collaborative solutions. Governor Tulafono opened the summit by stating that “resources are not finite—there are limits—and in an island setting as ours, the primary threat comes from people and how they behave responsibly in their use of land, water and air.” Participants developed a Population Declaration containing numerous policy initiatives, project proposals, and a recommendation to create a Population Commission. This declaration was presented to the legislature and Governor Tulafono for their consideration. American Samoa recently held elections, and the new government will be sworn in come January, at which point the working team I coordinate will be pressing the government to implement this important call to action.

    Population-health-environment (PHE) activities are still in their infancy in American Samoa. However, we do have some projects underway. The most progress so far has been with local education and outreach efforts. I am working with one of our local environmental educators to develop PHE lesson plans and activities for local schools. We will be advertising these lesson plans in the local newspaper and informing teachers that our staff are available to come to their schools to introduce these issues. In addition, we are developing a number of PHE educational resources to distribute at schools we visit.

    Family planning clinic staff and environmental educators have begun collaborating on a weekly radio series on the issue of rapid population growth. These discussions are raising the awareness of listeners and encouraging them to be good stewards of their health and their environment. In addition, a team of educators is planning the first annual World Population Day event here next year.

    On the policy side, we are collaborating with the various agencies, planning departments, and staff from the Secretariat of the Pacific Community to develop a Territorial Population Policy. Once this is developed, American Samoa will be one of only three island states in the South Pacific with such a policy. This policy is still in the early stages of being written, but I am confident that a draft will be developed over the coming year.

    Finally, American Samoa is ramping up its marine-protected-area efforts, especially the Department of Marine and Wildlife Resources’ community-based fisheries management program, which is an ideal venue for integrating population and environmental efforts. One of my main focus areas over the coming year will be looking at how I can connect the ongoing Department of Health activities with these programs. Although we are still in the early stages of addressing PHE issues in American Samoa, I am hoping to use the momentum from the recent summit to get us up to speed as quickly as possible.

    Alyssa Edwards, a former ECSP intern, is the population pressure local action strategy coordinator with the Coral Reef Advisory Group in American Samoa.

    Photo: Samoan schoolchildren play on a truck. Courtesy of Alyssa Edwards.
    Topics: development, environment, family planning, Guest Contributor, natural resources, PHE
    • http://www.blogger.com/profile/10264508040463804058 kimrennin

      Americans did achieve replacement rate fertility in the early 1970s. Yet our population hasn’t leveled off, and it isn’t expected to begin to level off any time in the next 100 years. Why? Because of the extraordinarily high rates of immigration that our national leaders have put in place.
      ————–
      kimrennin
      social bookmarking

    • http://www.blogger.com/profile/12871749575352820527 ECSP Staff

      Immigration’s contribution to overall U.S. population growth is notoriously difficult to tease out. According to the Population Reference Bureau’s (PRB) “World Population Highlights: Key Findings From PRB’s 2008 World Population Data Sheet,” immigration accounted for 36 percent of U.S. population growth from 2006-2007, with the rest due to natural increase. Of course, immigrants contribute to natural increase, too, since they often have children after arriving in the United States; a 2002 PRB report estimated that “one-fifth of the babies born in 2000 had a foreign-born mother.” According to the 2008 PRB report, the total fertility rate (TFR) “in the United States, 2.1, is high for an industrialized country. The higher TFR is in part a result of higher fertility among the growing U.S. Hispanic population, whose TFR is 3.0. But even the TFR of the traditional ‘majority’ population, white non-Hispanics, is 1.9, which is similar to the higher fertility countries of Europe.”

      It sounds as if natural increase, not immigration, is the main issue in American Samoa. Maybe Alyssa can weigh in?

    • http://www.blogger.com/profile/07258855282501991410 Edwards

      The situation in American Samoa is quite complex. Like many Pacific Island nations, there remains strong out migration as well as fertility rates higher than replacement level. In fact, there are more American Samoan’s living in mainland US and Hawaii then in all of the Territory. What this has meant is that in effect, American Samoa has not had to deal with the full ramifications of its population growth. On the other hand there has also been strong in-migration, as other Pacific Islanders move here for jobs and other opportunities, including the chance for their children to become US Nationals. As of the last census in 2000, close to half of those residing in American Samoa were not born here. Likewise the fertility rate has remained close to approximately 4 children per woman, over the last two census counts. With the large number of youth soon to enter their reproductive years (over 40% of American Samoa’s population is age 15 or below), their reproductive choices will largely shape the growth to come. What this means for our efforts is that we are looking at both immigration reform as well as reducing fertility rates.

Join the Conversation

  • RSS
  • subscribe
  • facebook
  • G+
  • twitter
  • iTunes
  • podomatic
  • youtube
Tweets by NewSecurityBeat

Trending Stories

  • unfccclogo1
  • Pop at COP: Population and Family Planning at the UN Climate Negotiations

Featured Media

Backdraft Podcast

play Backdraft
Podcasts

More »

What You're Saying

  • Women hauling ore in Kenieba, Mali - Jorden de Haan Building Peace by Formalizing Gold Mining in the Central Sahel
    Jorden De Haan: Thank you so much Omari! Let's continue to liaise on this stream of work and perhaps draft a similar...
  • 49890944808_c7d6dfef74_c Why Feminism Is Good for Your Health
    Melinda Cadwallader: It's not about what is "better" it is about creating balance. One without the other, Patriarchy...
  • Women hauling ore in Kenieba, Mali - Jorden de Haan Building Peace by Formalizing Gold Mining in the Central Sahel
    omari Mena: Well done!

Related Stories

No related stories.

  • woodrow
  • ecsp
  • RSS Feed
  • YouTube
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Home
  • Who We Are
  • Publications
  • Events
  • Wilson Center
  • Contact Us
  • Print Friendly Page

© Copyright 2007-2023. Environmental Change and Security Program.

Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. All rights reserved.

Developed by Vico Rock Media

Environmental Change and Security Program

Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars

Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center

  • One Woodrow Wilson Plaza
  • 1300 Pennsylvania Ave., NW
  • Washington, DC 20004-3027

T 202-691-4000