By 2045, global population will be north of 9 billion with increased urbanization and migration, natural resource stress, improved medical technologies, greater use of robotic labor, and a shift towards lifelong (and increasingly online) learning, according to a recent report from the UK Ministry of Defense.

Seasoned demography geeks know to anticipate the release of the UN Population Division’s World Population Prospects in the spring of odd-numbered years. An off-cycle update published last month in Science, summarizing new results and methodological changes to the projections, therefore provoked a buzz of interest and a mini-flurry of media coverage.

As the dust settles on an exciting United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), I finally have an opportunity to reflect on all that went down, and what it means for the post-2015 development process moving forward.

As the international community seeks to articulate a collective vision for sustainable development following the Millennium Development Goals, a vibrant new network has emerged in Madagascar to advance integrated population, health and environment (PHE) initiatives across this island nation.

The United Nations and the streets of Manhattan are going into global warming saturation mode, from Sunday’s People’s Climate March through the Tuesday climate change summit convened by Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and on through an annual green-energy event called Climate Week.

From Ukraine and the Middle East to sub-Saharan Africa and East Asia, the world is engulfed in a series of significant international crises. But despite such urgent issues, it would be a grave mistake to forget about the structural foreign policy challenges – such as access to water – that could become the crises of the future.

“Valuing women, paying greater attention to women’s rights – that’s the solution to our population growth issues and, I would argue, it’s also the solution to our food security challenges,” said Suzanne Petroni at the Thought for Food Summit in Berlin last year.