“Saving the planet depends on women achieving full human rights, and that begins with reproductive rights,” writes the Natural Resources Defense Council’s Frances Beinecke in a new set of essays on reproductive health published by the United Nations Foundation and the Aspen Institute.

Of all the Millennium Development Goals, the maternal health and sanitation targets are among the farthest off track, said Rebecca Fishman, operations and special projects director of WASH Advocates. [Video Below]

Democracy is fickle. Many of the competing theories on the best ways to foment and consolidate plural, inclusive governance or predict its rise and fall focus on political and economic forces. Yet a small group of demographers have explored population age structure as a catalyst for and reflection of a host of changes in societies that can affect governance.

Despite the fact that with proper interventions, the likelihood of mother-to-child transmission of HIV is less than five percent, expectant mothers with HIV or AIDS often face intense stigma and marginalization from health care providers around the world. As a result, in some areas, the mortality rate for mothers with HIV is seven to eight times greater than the rate for non-infected women, said Dr. Isabella Danel of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. [Video Below]

The emerging subfield of “security demographics” is interested in how demographic trends, such as youth bulges, high or low fertility rates, and sex ratios affect the security and stability of nation-states and regions. In our research, Andrea Den Boer and I have attempted to show that abnormally high sex ratios – situations where there are significantly more men than women – have been a security concern in the past and may affect security and stability in the future.

When I first came on board the Wilson Center last Earth Day, I wrote that I wanted to forge new paths and identify ways that reproductive health, environmental conservation, and women’s empowerment affect our lives today and in the future.

In 2013 the United Nations Population Division revised its population projections to show that population could grow even faster than previously anticipated, especially in Africa. Planning ahead for feeding a hot, hungry, teeming planet is both a numbers game and social venture. Calories, climate change, and acres of land are some of the factors on one side of the equation. The 7 billion people in the world, projected to grow to 9.6 billion by 2050, are on the other.