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The State of World Population 2000

What does sex discrimination have to do with economic growth? HIV/AIDS? Infant mortality?

Lives Together, Worlds Apart: Men and Women in a Time of Change, the new State of World Population 2000 report from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), examines a broad range of evidence from around the world on how sex discrimination holds back efforts to reduce poverty, improve health, stem the spread of HIV/AIDS and slow rapid population growth.

The report points out that gender inequality, discrimination and violence are still the rule rather than the exception in most societies:

  • One woman in three will experience violence during her lifetime, most often at the hands of someone she knows.

  • Some 2 million girls under 15 are forced into the sex trade each year. Trafficking for sexual purposes is the fastest-growing area of organized crime.

  • Two-thirds of the 300 million children without access to education are girls.

In addition, gender inequality worldwide perpetuates poor health and inadequate reproductive health care:

  • More than half a million women continue to die each year from complications of pregnancy and childbirth. There are 20 million unsafe abortions each year, resulting in 78,000 deaths.

  • For social as well as physical reasons, women are much more vulnerable to the HIV infection than men—in Africa, HIV-positive women now outnumber men by 2 million. STDs afflict five times more women than men.

However, there is some good news. More than two-thirds of the countries in the world, including almost all of Latin America, have modified legislation to improve women’s access to resources, education and health services, and their decision-making power in families. Global agreements reached at the International Conference of Population and Development (Cairo, 1994) and at the Fourth World Conference on Women (Beijing, 1995) have provided a legal foundation for ending gender discrimination.

Among the report's recommendations are to achieve universal access to sexual and reproductive health by the year 2015, protect poor women who suffer adverse impacts on health services from economic and social crises, and oppose traditional harmful practices including female genital mutilation and "honor killings."

For more information:

  • Read the State of World Population 2000 report online at www.unfpa.org.


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