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Climate Change May Weaken Children’s Education in the Tropics
›In parts of the tropics, exposure to extreme temperature or rainfall in early life is associated with fewer years of schooling in later childhood. This finding comes from my new article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, with coauthor Clark Gray. As climate change leads to increasingly severe heat waves, floods, droughts, and hurricanes, it is important to understand how extreme weather impacts kids’ education in different parts of the world. This will help decisionmakers develop solutions to keep children in school in a world of increasing climate variability.
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Africa’s Future Workforce: Investing in Youth for Economic Prosperity and Equity
›“African countries are not in the middle of one transition, they are in the midst of several transitions,” said Parfait Eloundou-Enyegue, Professor and Chair of the Department of Development Sociology at Cornell University, at a recent Wilson Center event on demographic trends on the continent, and investing in youth to ensure economic prosperity. “All of these transitions are an opportunity for prosperity, an opportunity for growth, an opportunity to build human capital,” said Eloundou-Enyegue. However, demographic, cultural, political, and economic changes can also exacerbate existing inequalities between and within countries. The challenge is not only to build prosperity, but to do it for all, said Eloundou-Enyegue.
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ICPD at 25: Unfinished Business Points to Unmet Needs
›“The ICPD (International Conference on Population and Development) Programme of Action is a promise. A promise that was made 25 years ago to young people, the intention of which was to give young people hope—hope that their rights, their needs, and their demands would be met,” said Kobe Smith, Vice President of the Youth Advocacy Movement at International Planned Parenthood Federation/ Western Hemisphere Region, at a recent Wilson Center event. This year marks the 25th anniversary of ICPD in Cairo.
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Where Life Begins: Reducing Risky Births in a Refugee Camp
›Zaatari camp, the largest Syrian refugee camp in the world, sits less than 12 kilometers away from the border between Syria and northern Jordan. Rows of houses disappear into the desert, making it hard to tell where the camp begins and ends. Metal containers pieced together like patchwork are home to around 80,000 refugees. The remnants of tattered UNHCR tents cover holes in the walls. Almost seven years after the camp opened, this dusty sea of tin roofs has evolved into a permanent settlement.
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Forging A New Path Toward Universal Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights
›“The Guttmacher-Lancet Commission could not come at a better time,” said Patricia Da Silva, Associate Director of the International Planned Parenthood Federation United Nations Liaison Office. “It is indeed the call to action that is required; showing us that comprehensive sexual and reproductive rights must be ensured for all.” She spoke at a recent Wilson Center event on the work of the Guttmacher-Lancet Commission on Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR). The Commission, an international collaboration of 16 SRHR experts from Africa, Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and North and South America, recently published a report, Accelerate Progress—Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights for All, which makes concrete recommendations for countries to address SRHR gaps and inequalities.
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Patricia Da Silva: ‘The Time is Now’ to Accelerate Progress for Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights
›“Almost everyone of reproductive age—about 4.3 billion people—will not have access to at least one essential or reproductive health intervention over the course of their lives,” said Patricia Da Silva, Associate Director, International Planned Parenthood Federation United Nations Liaison Office. She spoke at a recent Wilson Center event showcasing recommendations from the Guttmacher-Lancet Commission report, “Accelerate progress–sexual and reproductive health and rights for all,” on how to advance sexual and reproductive health from a human rights perspective.
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Innovative Approaches Empower Adolescent Girls to Live HIV-free Lives
›“Everyone in the community knew that I was the next [to get pregnant], but I was so determined that until I achieve my dream of becoming an accountant, I will not drop out of school, and I will not get pregnant,” said Rebecca Acio, a 19-year-old Ambassador for the Strengthening School-Community Accountability for Girls’ Education (SAGE) DREAMS Project, Uganda. She spoke at a recent Wilson Center event on emerging lessons from the DREAMS Innovation Challenge. As a peer educator at her school in Lira, Uganda, and a temporary dropout herself, Acio “knew what it cost to be a dropout” and worked to identify other at-risk girls to encourage them to stay in school.
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Does Demographic Change Set the Pace of Development?
›This year, 2018, marks the 60th anniversary of a landmark publication by a pair of academic social scientists who first recognized the close relationship between population age structure (the distribution of a country’s population, by age) and development. In Population Growth and Development in Low Income Countries (Princeton U. Press, 1958), demographer Ansley Coale (1917-2002) and economist Edgar M. Hoover (1907-1992) theorized that eventual declines in fertility would transform developing-country age structures. Coale and Hoover demonstrated that these newly transformed age structures would exhibit larger shares of citizens in the working ages, and smaller shares of dependent children and seniors (Fig. 1). This transition, they argued, would someday help lift countries with youthful populations in Asia, Latin America, and Africa out of the low-income bracket.
Showing posts from category youth.